A big congratulations to Conor Coghlan, second year, who won the biodiversity research and poster competition just before mid term. Conor illustrated a beautiful poster on the Irish conservation projects on the red squirrel, pine martin, corncrake and the white tailed eagle, pictured below. He won a pineapple plant for his effort! The second years did wonderful research on conservation and biodiversity in Ireland, focusing on native species and what actions they can take themselves to help conserve and promote biodiversity. They focused on actions taken on farms, in woodlands and wetlands. Some actions they identified were: allow wildflowers to grow around their gardens and farms, retain any waterlogged land, create ponds with shallow margins, reduce the use of pesticides, plant native trees and shrubs, plant pollinator friendly perennial plants and leave patches of nettles grow. They identified beautiful Irish species to be conserved, including: the marsh marigold, pine Martin, sessile oak, curlew, conecrake, Irish hare, buzzard, yellowhammer, many species of bat and 7 spot ladybird, to name a few! Well done to all the boys.