Swimming Upstream Patsy Peril in conversation with Eoghan Daltun

When the hydro-electric station opened in Ardnacrusha in 1929, concerns raised proved well-founded. Salmon numbers plummeted and have continued to do so ever since, exacerbated by fish farms. Swimming Upstream (The O’Brien Press), written by Patsy Peril with Deirdre Nuttall, charts Patsy’s mission to save the wild salmon in the Shannon and all over the Atlantic. He has campaigned restlessly on the subject for decades, working with the North Atlantic Salmon Conservation Organisation. Join Patsy in conversation with environmentalist Eoghan Daltun. 

Supported by Taighde Éireann – Research Ireland (formerly Science Foundation Ireland) as part of Science Week 2024.

Patsy Peril grew up in the fishing community of Coonagh, on the outskirts of Limerick City. Involved in inland fisheries all his life, he is also an experienced light aircraft pilot. He has been deeply concerned with environmental matters since childhood, in particular concerning the health and future of Irish rivers. For decades, he has been involved in organisations involved with the oversight, protection, reclamation and sustainability of our natural environment, as well as both local and national salmon net fishers’ associations. Patsy continues his activism, striving for a time when our natural waterways are respected and cared for, and for a healthy and sustainable balance between the uses of our environment and its wellbeing. Co-authored with Deirdre Nuttall, Patsy’s remarkable new book, Swimming Upstream is part memoir, part call-to-action, the story of one man’s lifelong mission to save the Atlantic Wild Salmon. An inspiring journey, filled with hope and practical solutions to save a species from extinction and help protect our precious rivers and waters.

Eoghan Daltun is a sculpture conservator, a farmer, an author and, above all, a rewilder. He spent seven years studying sculpture in Carrara, Tuscany. In 2009, he sold the cottage in Kilmainham he had rebuilt mostly single-handed from a ruin – using the original stone. The proceeds went to buy a long-abandoned 73-acre farm overlooking the Atlantic near Eyeries on the Beara Peninsula, West Cork. Over the years since, Eoghan has brought life in all its explosive vibrancy back to the land, with new temperate rainforest spontaneously forming where previously there was only barren grass. Restoring such an incredibly rich ecosystem has taken him on a fantastic voyage of discovery, which he charted in his award-winning memoir An Irish Atlantic Rainforest: A Personal Journey into the Magic of Rewilding. Rewilding most of the land, and High Nature Value farming the rest, has given him plenty of time to reflect deeply on the ecological crisis unfolding at terrifying speed all around us, and its solutions. Eoghan lives on the farm with his two sons, Liam and Seánie. The Magic of an Irish Rainforest: A Visual Journey is his second book.