The Exploitation of Irish Peat

Abstract

PROF. RYAN in his article under the above title in NATURE of August 4 (p. 728) states that the labour difficulty is a serious obstacle in so far that the work is seasonal. I should like to suggest that this can be overcome by adopting the method employed for the production of moss-litter (used for bedding for animals) as now practised in Scotland and elsewhere. This method allows the men employed to be engaged in cutting peat in the earlier part of the winter and whenever the weather does not permit other operations. It follows that a great quantity of the wet peat lies throughout the winter exposed to the weather, and by the alternate freezing and thawing which it experiences the texture is very much opened up. Consequent on this, when the peat is built up in the spring it dries very much more quickly than material newly cut.