Ireland has roughly 400,000km of dry stone walls through its countryside, mostly in the…

Ireland has roughly 400,000km of dry stone walls through its countryside, mostly in the west and south where the land is rockier. Farmers needed to clear stones from their fields so grass could grow, and they needed something to divide their land, so they killed two birds with one stone. The oldest known examples are the Céide Fields in County Mayo (third slide), dating back nearly 6,000 years. The stonier the land, the more walls you’ll see and the smaller the fields get.