Turf Cutting and Bogland on Achill IslandPart 4 - Storing TurfStoring The TurfWhen the turf is dry it is either bagged or 'lumped' - ie gathered into small mounds about 3 foot high (90 cm). Then either the bags or the mounds of turf are loaded onto trailors and brought home to be stored near the house to be used in the fires and cookers at home.
If the turf is not in plastic bags and is not going to be stored in a turf-shed there is a tradition of building up a 6-7 foot high (2 metre) mound of turf, called a clamp of turf - but it is not as simple as that - it is never as simple as that! In order to encourage any rain that may fall during the winter months (and Spring, and Summer, and Autumn!) to flow off the clamp without prenetrating into it, and thus soaking the turf, the outside layer of the clamp must be built with care, with the turf laid like slates on a roof. A well constructed 'clamp' of turf is a very pretty sight to see and is a work of art in itself. Though even if it rains heavily and the pieces of turf (a sod) gets wet it is only damp on the outside of the turf because the sod has compacted and become as hard as a rock. Once the turf is rock hard you could put it into a bucket of water and only the outside would really get wet. Admittedly any 'spongy' turf will soak up the water like a....sponge!
And why all this work? Well, in the winter months, with the storms, gales and lashing rain outside trying to take the roof off the house, one can sit in front of a roaring fire, smelling the wonderful natural fragrant scent of the turf burning and enjoy the results of those hard days' work in those far off warm sunny days of spring and summer. Personally, I wouldn't swap a turf fire for anything. It is part of the tradition of Achill island. Sadly, it is being supplanted by oil-fired central heating. Hopefully, turf cutting, especially by hand, will never become a dead tradition. Updated: 9th March 2012
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