Irish Spatial Data Exchange
Commonage GIS Dataset
Commonage Framework Planning was a joint initiative between the National Parks and Wildlife Service and the Department of Agriculture and Food. Teams combining agricultural and ecological skills to assess the sustainable use of these areas have surveyed all known commonage areas in Ireland.
To date in excess of 4,400 plans have been prepared, covering more than 440,000 hectares. Where necessary, destocking (removal of some of the stock kept on commonage) was prescribed to ensure recovery of the vegetation. These plans have been implemented through REPS, AEOS and the NPWS Farm Plan Scheme, as relevant, from 1999 - 2012.
A commitment has been made to monitor the condition of commonages to demonstrate, in particular, that initiatives are delivering recovery in overgrazed areas and that undergrazing is not becoming a problem. Ireland also has obligations to monitor the state of SACs containing uplands and peatlands in non-commonage areas. This involves a reassessment of habitats in commonage areas, some of which were assessed as early as 1999, and also non-commonage areas.
Planning teams comprising both agriculturalists and environmentalists have been trained and re-surveys have been completed in commonage blocks in Counties Mayo, Galway, Cork, Kerry, Donegal, Sligo, Leitrim, Tipperary, Limerick and Louth between 2004 and 2010. Monitoring reports have been forwarded to the EU Commission highlighting the findings and trends. Additional survey work in 2007 focussed on Counties Mayo, Donegal and Kerry. In 2008, all commonage that had a destocking of greater than 50% were re-assessed.
In this context GIS files were set up to describe:
- Destocking rates assigned to Agricultural Units
- Habitat types and damage categories assigned to Agricultural Sub-Units and
- Locations of Base-Stations and habitat types / damage categories recorded at these stations
A review of all the Commonage Framework Plans, setting sustainable stocking rates, will conclude in 2012 and will be communicated to all shareholders by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. This information is not contained here.
Simple
- Alternate title
-
Commonage survey
- Date (Publication)
- 2012-01-27T00:00:00
- Citation identifier
- https://data.gov.ie/dataset/ / commonage-gis-dataset
- Purpose
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These datasets present the spatial output from Commonage Framework Plans, and facilitate the monitoring of the condition of commonage.
- Status
- Completed
- Point of contact
-
Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage
National Parks and Wildlife Service
Point of contact
- Maintenance and update frequency
- As needed
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GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0
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Habitats and biotopes
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-
GEMET - Concepts, version 3.1
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-
habitat, biodiversity, vegetation cover, erosion control
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-
National Parks and Wildlife Service
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commonage, National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS, species, habitat protection, heritage, National Biodiversity Plan
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ISO 3166
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-
Ireland
-
- Use limitation
- Access constraints
- Other restrictions
- Other constraints
-
opyright Government of Ireland. This dataset was created by National Parks and Wildlife Service, Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. This copyright material is licensed for re-use under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
- Spatial representation type
- Vector
- Denominator
- 5000
- Language
- English
- Character set
- UTF8
- Topic category
-
- Environment
- Biota
- Farming
))
Vertical extent
- Minimum value
- 0
- Maximum value
- 1014
Vertical CS
Vertical datum
- Reference system identifier
-
EPSG
/
https://www.opengis.net/def/crs/EPSG/0/29903
EPSG Geodetic Parameter Dataset EPSG 2009-11-25
- Distribution format
-
Name Version Esri shapefile
v10.x
- Distributor contact
-
Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage
National Parks and Wildlife Service
Point of contact
- OnLine resource
-
Protocol Linkage Name application/zip
https://www.npws.ie/sites/default/files/general/commonage-dec-12.zip Zip file containing shapefiles download
- Hierarchy level
- Dataset
Conformance result
- Title
-
INSPIRE Data Specification on Habitats and Biotopes
- Alternate title
-
INSPIRE Data Specifications v3.0
- Date (Publication)
- 2013-12-10
- Explanation
-
The INSPIRE Directive or INSPIRE lays down a general framework for a Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) for the purposes of European Community environmental policies and policies or activities which may have an impact on the environment.
- Pass
- No
Conformance result
- Title
-
COMMISSION REGULATION (EU) No 1089/2010 of 23 November 2010 implementing Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards interoperability of spatial data sets and services
- Alternate title
-
INSPIRE Interoperability Regulation
- Date (Publication)
- 2010-12-08
- Explanation
-
Level of conformance with the COMMISSION REGULATION (EU) No 1089/2010 of 23 November 2010 implementing Directive 2007/2/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council as regards interoperability of spatial data sets and services
- Pass
- No
- Statement
-
**Commonage Agricultural Units shapefile (Commonage_Base_Plan_2011_National_v04.shp)**
This polygon GIS file shows the Commonage Agricultural Units in the Republic of Ireland. Assigned to these Agricultural Units are destocking rates as assessed by teams combining agricultural and ecological skills.
Attributes assigned to Agricultural Units in the shapefile include
- prescribed destocking
- date of survey
- name of ecological / agricultural assessors
**Commonage Agricultural Sub-Units shapefile (Commonage_Base_SU_2011_National_v03.shp)**
This polygon GIS file shows the Commonage Agricultural Sub-Units in the Republic of Ireland. Assigned to these Agricultural Sub-Units are habitat types, as well as vegetation condition types or levels of damage as assessed by teams combining agricultural and ecological skills.
The following vegetation condition types are assigned to Agricultural Sub-Units in the shapefile:
Undamaged:
U: Areas where grazing damage is not detectable
Moderate damage :
MU: Areas where grazing damage is clearly detectable
MM: Areas where grazing damage is evident but nowhere very heavy
MS: Areas where there are many signs of grazing damage but where the S/S* threshold is not reached
Severe damage:
S: Based on bare peat (>5%) and heather condition
S*: Based on bare peat (>10%) and heather condition
The habitat type attribute field holds the following categories:
I Blanket Bog
II Wet Heath
III Dry Heath (includes maritime)
IV Upland Grassland
V Other habitats
VI Improved Grassland
VII Dune
VIII Unimproved wet grassland
IX Unimproved dry grassland
X Fen/Marsh/Swamp
XI Saltmarsh
XII Beach/Shingle/Reef/Shore
XIII Limestone Pavement/Grassland
XIV Limestone Pavement (>75% rock)
XV Scrub
XVI Permanent open water (turlough)
**Commonage Stations (Commonage_Base_Station_2011_National_v01.shp)**
This point GIS file shows the Commonage Stations in the Republic of Ireland. Assigned to these Stations are habitat types, as well as vegetation condition types or levels of damage as assessed by teams combining agricultural and ecological skills.
As in the Sub-Units file, the following vegetation condition types are assigned to Commonage Stations in the shapefile:
Undamaged:
U: Areas where grazing damage is not detectable
Moderate damage :
MU: Areas where grazing damage is clearly detectable
MM: Areas where grazing damage is evident but nowhere very heavy
MS: Areas where there are many signs of grazing damage but where the S/S* threshold is not reached
Severe damage:
S: Based on bare peat (>5%) and heather condition
S*: Based on bare peat (>10%) and heather condition
The habitat type attribute field holds the following categories:
I Blanket Bog
II Wet Heath
III Dry Heath (includes maritime)
IV Upland Grassland
V Other habitats
VI Improved Grassland
VII Dune
VIII Unimproved wet grassland
IX Unimproved dry grassland
X Fen/Marsh/Swamp
XI Saltmarsh
XII Beach/Shingle/Reef/Shore
XIII Limestone Pavement/Grassland
XIV Limestone Pavement (>75% rock)
XV Scrub
XVI Permanent open water (turlough)
Metadata
- File identifier
- 9033ec55-b0f0-49e3-9a7b-4fea438c961d XML
- Metadata language
- English
- Character set
- UTF8
- Hierarchy level
- Dataset
- Date stamp
- 2025-05-12T14:29:28
- Metadata standard name
-
ISDI Metadata Profile
- Metadata standard version
-
1.2
- Metadata author
-
Organisation name Individual name Electronic mail address Role Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage
National Parks and Wildlife Service
Point of contact
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