There is a “zero tolerance” approach to the illegal cutting of hedges between March 1 and August 31 each year, the National Parks and Wildlife Service of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage has warned.

This follows a recent prosecution related to illegal hedgerow destruction in Kildare, which resulted in a large fine.

Commenting on the matter, Minister of State for Heritage and Electoral Reform, Malcolm Noonan said:

“Hedgerows are superhighways for nature, a hugely valuable and biodiverse network that extends throughout the country and includes some of the oldest and most well established habitat in our landscapes.

The vast majority of landowners are already aware that, while limited exemptions do exist, it is illegal to damage or destroy hedgerows during the breeding season.

Welcoming the NPWS’s “zero tolerance approach” to offences under the Wildlife Act, the minister of state added:

“These are extremely serious matters and my department is responding by actively recruiting additional conservation rangers and establishing a Wildlife Crime Unit to properly resource our efforts to protect nature.

“I call on members of the public who witness these acts to contact and provide as much evidence as they can to the NPWS.”

Commenting on the need for a zero tolerance approach, Padraig O’Donnell, regional manager with the NPWS, said:

“We are experiencing a crisis in our countryside and we have to undertake a zero tolerance approach.

We’re losing hedgerows forever, and we need to temper it. There are exemptions and not all hedge cutting is illegal. This is not about people clipping a hedge, this is about hedgerow destruction.

“The biodiversity-rich hedgerows in the greater countryside are part of our shared heritage, but these are being destroyed by contractors and landowner, and we are determined that this must stop,” O’Donnell stressed.

In addition to increasing staffing resources on the ground and establishing the Wildlife Crime Unit, NPWS has said that it will bring further cases to court for any cases that see bird nesting habitat destroyed through the removal of hedgerows.

NPWS is on “high alert” for hedgerow cutting and hedgerow removal, O’Donnell added, and “we are determined to follow up on reports and prosecute where possible”.

Dates for the cutting of hedges are set down in primary legislation under the Wildlife Acts. Section 40 of the Act prohibits the cutting, grubbing, burning or destruction of vegetation, with certain strict exemptions, from 1 March to 31 August.

There is provision in the legislation for some restricted exemptions from the prohibition during the closed period, the NPWS noted.

Examples of these include: works undertaken in the ordinary course of agriculture or forestry; for health and safety reasons;  the destruction of noxious weeds, in respect of works permitted under statute and for works undertaken for road safety reasons.

Both landowners and public authorities can take reasonable steps to address hedges and trees for road safety reasons at any time of the year, it was noted.