Birr, Co Offaly is continuing to live up to its name, with night-time grass temperatures as low as minus 16 degrees forecast for this weekend, writes Kitty Holland
Recent nights have been "among the coldest of the past 10 years on the basis of having had very, very low temperatures across the country", Gerry Murphy of Met Éireann said.
Thursday night's air temperature in Birr dropped to minus 7.8 degrees, and the grass temperature was minus 16.
"The bitterly cold spell will continue over the weekend with further snow showers in Ulster, north Connacht and west Munster," Mr Murphy said.
Snow was lying in these areas, he said, but it was not expected to settle on the ground in Leinster.
The cold weather is pushing up costs for cattle and sheep farmers, an Irish Farmers' Association spokesman said. "The feed market is tight with costs going up as more farmers are out there looking for feed in the past few days."
In parts of Donegal and Sligo some schools closed again yesterday due to heavy snow falls, but they are expected to reopen on Monday. A spokeswoman for the Department of Education said these schools "will be expected to make the time up again".
The AA said there was no discernible increase in road traffic accidents. "It would seem people really are heeding the warnings people like the gardaí and ourselves have been giving and have been taking its easy on the roads," said a spokeswoman.
Age Action Ireland has urged people with elderly neighbours, relatives and friends to particularly make contact with them during this cold spell.
Mr Murphy said the cold weather would continue until Monday, but a change would come on Tuesday when "more typical Irish winter weather" would arrive in the form of "bands of rain moving in from the Atlantic".
The recent cold weather was caused by the past week's winds coming in from the North Pole, preceded by those of the previous weeks coming from the east.
"In the winter, winds from the east, from the freezing continent, are always very cold," Mr Murphy said.