Plants are essential to everyone's lives. Welcome to Plantlife.
Protecting the colour in our road verges
New Plantlife campaign 2012
Road verges are close to many members’ hearts. Plantlife receives more enquiries about them than anything else, from both members and non-members frustrated and upset when their favourite local flower-rich verge is mown to within an inch of its life.
This year’s campaign for better management is in the planning stages and Plantlife wants to hear about your favourite road verges and any complaints you have about local management.
Road verges are the bank we should all be investing in. They give so much pleasure: we pass them every day, colourful slivers of countryside in towns, or vital sanctuaries for wildlife in an intensively farmed countryside. Whilst there are only 85,000 hectares of flower-rich grassland left, there are about 238,000 hectares of road verge in Great Britain. They are literally on our doorstep.
Yet so often, this vital habitat is mismanaged and under attack; cut too early when still in flower, sprayed off with poisons as ‘weeds’ and smothered with cuttings so leading to the loss of diversity as nettles, coarse grasses and cow parsley take over. As the floral diversity disappears, so both its value for wildlife and its beauty vanishes.
How are the road verges near you? Is there a verge that gives you particular pleasure? Or one that you wish to complain about? If so, please let us know below:
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