The Heritage Council has launched a nationwide hunt for what may literally be the last straw of the last harvest of the millennium.
The council is urgently seeking a few thousand bundles of oaten straw to use for thatch in a unique farmhouse restoration programme this spring.
The council has exhausted its few remaining outlets for the oaten straw, which has to be grown specially for thatching and harvested by a reaper-binder.
Straw which has been harvested by a combine-harvester is not suitable for thatching and there is no commercial supply of oaten straw available from abroad.
Ms Mary Hanna of the heritage council explained yesterday that the council had checked its usual outlets for traditionally grown and harvested oaten straw but none was found.
"We are hoping that someone out there may have a few thousand bundles which would allow us get on with the restoration programme in the spring," she said.
"Unfortunately, our main source of supply, a traditional farmer, has retired from business and we cannot source the material, even internationally."
Ms Hanna said the council had already restored the walls of the farmhouse by making the traditional mud bricks which were used in the original building.
She said specialist work had also been carried out on eradicating woodworm in the existing roof timbers and that the thatch was now needed urgently.
"We know we could get the oaten thatch if we waited for the September harvest, but we would like to proceed now with the project," she said.
Oaten straw was needed, she said, because the building had been "fletch-thatched", a complicated method of thatching which involved using the tied ends of the straw to secure the roof rather than traditional willow pegs.
Ms Hanna, who is preparing a discussion paper on the future of thatching in Ireland, said modern farming methods meant traditional long straw is no longer available and has to be specially grown.
She said the alternative material, reed, has deteriorated in quality because of pollution of watercourses. As a result, more and more straw from the UK has to be imported here.
She said the question of continued Heritage Council support for buildings restored with straw imported from countries as far away as Poland and Hungary, was recently discussed at a national seminar on thatching.
Ms Hanna can be contacted at the Heritage Council: tel 05670777