This week, we helped to hand-spread locally harvested wildflower seed on nearly 10 hectares of on our northern block fields. This is our second year working on this with Glorious Cotswold Grasslands, a project with Cotswolds National Landscape.
This is the first step in the long-term management to restoring these 6 previously arable fields to species-rich grassland, increasing the floristic diversity with wildflowers of local provenance and genetics. The fields were cut and baled, then scarified to lightly open up the sward. Once the seed was spread, we moved our longhorn cattle herd in to trample seeds into the soil, help to control aggressive grasses, and create bare patches which help many wildflower seeds to germinate.
Calcareous grassland is referred to as Western Europe’s equivalent of the tropical rainforest because it is one of our most biodiverse habitats containing as many as 40 different plant species in a single square metre along with all the insects, birds and mammals that depend on the plants. In the 1930s, 40% of the Cotswolds National Landscape was covered in wildflower-rich grassland. Now, less than 1.5% remains, but this 1.5% is critically important because the UK has lost almost all of this habitat elsewhere.
The good news is that projects like ours are working hard to restore this special habitat. Glorious Cotswold Grasslands have initiated restoration work on approximately 500 hectares of land throughout the Cotswold National Landscape – an amazing achievement. You can find out more about the Glorious Cotswold Grasslands project on their website.
Thanks to Cotswolds National Landscape and all the amazing volunteers who showed up to help spread seed.
Stay tuned for what these fields look like in the coming years!