Species-rich meadows are full of life, sound and colour. If you admire one for long enough, you will see and hear bumblebees buzzing, grasshoppers stridulating and you may even see the retreating tail of a small mammal or the sight of swallows swooping down to the meadow, feasting on insects. Derbyshire Wildlife Trust’s (DWT) 2030 strategy seeks to support landscape-scale change to create more space for nature, including restoring flower-rich meadows. Meadows are a special habitat for wildlife but also for us to sit in and enjoy the diverse nature that use them.
Yet since the 1930s, over 97% of wildflower meadows have been lost, which equates to an area the size of Wales. Wildflower meadows are an incredibly important habitat, and many species rely on them. A typical meadow can comprise of 570 flowers per square metre in summer. The range of flowers that grow in meadows helps to store up to 500% more carbon than fields of just grass due to their long roots; some of which can reach down two metres into the ground. Meadows can support nearly 1,400 species of invertebrates which in turn provides food for many birds, bats and small mammals as well as being places for them to hide and nest in.
DWT has ambitious plans as part of their Wilder Derbyshire 2030 Vision, to rewild 100,000 hectares of land and water by 2030 - a bold target to help create a county where people and wildlife thrive together. One of the projects helping DWT achieve that goal is the Allestree Park Community Rewilding Project. The community rewilding project places people at the heart of nature recovery to create an even better nature-rich wild space. Flower-rich meadows are a habitat we want to restore and enhance, by making them more diverse and reinstating natural processes such as natural regeneration of species and improving soil health. But species-rich grasslands vary in condition. Some grasslands have been looked after for many years, so their plant community is very diverse, whereas other grasslands may be at the beginning of their restoration journey and only contain a few plant species. At Allestree Park, we are enhancing some of those species-poor grasslands by kickstarting their floral diversity through an intervention such as seed sowing, green hay spreading or planting of wildflowers.
This August, we have carried out our first phase of meadow enhancement with the help of some brilliant volunteers and children from the Pakistan Community Centre in Derby. The group helped to spread flower-rich green hay taken from another meadow at Allestree Park. Green hay is harvested wildflowers and grasses collected just before they drop their seed. The green hay we harvested contained a variety of wildflowers including Yellow Rattle, Common Knapweed, Red Clover and Bird’s-foot Trefoil. Spreading the hay across the species-poor grassland allowed the seeds to fall onto the bare ground we created, ready to germinate next year and help us to restore the species diversity in that field.
When you restore a meadow, you set in motion the journey of your grassland. As the meadow is correctly cared for, the floral diversity begins to establish, but it can take a long time for all the desirable species to arrive. Faster-growing flowers such as Red Clover, Yellow Rattle and Buttercups will begin to bloom in the first few years. Slower-growing perennials such as Betony, Lady’s Bedstraw and Ox-eye Daisy may take longer to appear. And if you’re lucky, after seven to ten years, vetches and orchids may emerge as your meadow begins to mature, and the plant community settles down.
The restoration journey of a flower-rich meadow is incredibly exciting, and every time a new species germinates or spreads, it feels like a great accomplishment! Meadows come in all shapes and sizes, from hectares of farmland to a roadside verge. We can all take action for our local wildlife by creating our own ‘mini-meadow’ in our lawns or as part of a community space. DWT’s Strategy calls for bold, transformative change to reverse nature’s decline, something everyone can be part of. By making space for nature in your local park or garden, you’re helping wildlife thrive as well as creating a nature-rich space for people to benefit from. Every flower helps! If you feel inspired to create your own meadow, no matter how big or small, then please get in touch.
We will be further enhancing the meadows at Allestree Park with some supplementary planting this October. If you’d like to be involved, please get in touch with us at allestreepark@derbyshirewt.co.uk.
