may I introduce you to...

Peat


Peat forms when plant material, usually in marshy areas, is inhibited from decaying fully by acidic and anaerobic conditions. It is composed mainly of peat moss or sphagnum, but may also include other marshland vegetation: trees, grasses, fungi, as well as other types of organic remains, such as insects, and animal corpses. Under certain conditions, the decomposition of the latter (in the absence of oxygen) is inhibited, and archaeologists often take advantage of this.

Peat layer growth and the degree of decomposition (or humification) depends principally on its composition and on the degree of waterlogging. Peat formed in very wet conditions will grow considerably faster, and be less decomposed, than that in drier places. This allows climatologists to use peat as an indicator of climatic change. The composition of peat can also be used to reconstruct ancient ecologies by examining the types and quantities of its organic elements.

Under the right conditions, peat is the earliest stage in the formation of coal. Most modern peat bogs formed in high latitudes after the retreat of the glaciers at the end of the last ice age some 9,000 years ago. They usually grow slowly, at the rate of about a millimetre per year.

The peat in the world's peatlands has been forming for 360 million years and contains 550 Gt of carbon.[1]
source: wikipedia.org

 

The heart of a winter's warmth in Ireland for many centuries

 

I thought that the winter warmth in Ireland was 40% proof Whis4ey. (And if not it should be)

 

I heard on the radio that the Dutch government has bought a huge amount of peat bogs in Ireland for the purpose of preserving them and not allowing them to be dug up!