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Read in: EnglishCymraeg
Known as nature’s meadow maker, Yellow Rattle, is the single most important plant you need when creating a wildflower meadow.
Here’s everything you need to know.
Yellow rattle, commonly known as the meadow maker, is one of the most important plants you need for a meadow. Without it, vigorous grasses can grow unchecked and smother flowers you want to encourage.
As Yellow Rattle Rhinanthus minor grows in a meadow the grass will become thinner, making room for plants like Oxeye Daisy, Knapweeds and Vetches to appear. And if you’re lucky, maybe even an orchid will pop up.
Then large bees, especially bumblebees, move in and pollinate the flowers of yellow rattle and it’s large seed pods dry and ripen. This leaves the seeds rattling around inside. Farmers used to use the sound of the rattling seeds as their cue to cut the hay – hence the name.
Yellow Rattle is a very useful starting plant when making a wildflower meadow, but it can be a little tricky to establish. Here are some top tips to get you started:
If you have very fertile soil, it might be trickier to grow Yellow Rattle. Poor and infertile soils are best and following the steps above will help reduce the fertility of your soil over time.
Your go-to guide for transforming places into flower-rich meadows.
Late summer (August-September) is the best time to sow Yellow Rattle. It will not grow successfully if sown in the spring. The seeds can be sown no later than November because they need about 4 months below 5C to germinate in the spring.
Yellow Rattle is easy to collect by hand. Simply hold a paper bag under the ripe seed pod and shake it gently with your fingers. Collecting larger quantities can easily be done using a vacuum or leaf blower.
WATCH: Plantlife’s Sarah Shuttleworth collects Yellow Rattle with a vacuum.
There are a number of reasons why Yellow Rattle may disappear from a meadow, including:
For meadows, we recommend 0.5-2.5kg per hectare/10-20g per m2 if you are collecting your own seed.
There are several possible reasons:
Managing or making meadows, whether in a lawn or larger site, can sometimes lead to prickly problem plants like docks or nettles. Follow our expert advice for managing problem plants.
Yellow Rattle, is the single most important plant you need when creating a wildflower meadow. Here’s everything you need to know.
Want to start a community meadow, but not sure where to begin? Read our guide to creating a flower-filled haven for your local community.
Thousands of people across the country have let it grow for #NoMowMay this year.
Our gardens have bloomed with wildflowers and grasses and we’ve seen our green spaces grow beautifully wild – all to give nature the boost it deserves.
Every No Mow May lawn is different and perhaps that’s what makes them so beautiful. But we are all connected by a common goal…to leave space for nature.
Thank you to everyone who has taken part in No Mow May, we hope you’ve enjoyed watching your gardens and green spaces bloom. Whether you left your whole garden to grow, kept a section short, had a go at growing a wildflower meadow or just left a space to grow wild – it all makes a difference.
We’ve absolutely loved looking through all the pictures you’ve sent in and following your #NoMowMay journeys on social media. Please keep them coming!
Since the 1930s, we’ve lost approximately 97% of flower-rich meadows and with them gone are vital food needed by pollinators like bees and butterflies.
And with 1 in 5 British wildflowers under threat, it more important than ever to change the way we manage our gardens. A healthy lawn or green space with some long grass and wildflowers benefits wildlife, tackles pollution and can even lock away carbon below ground.
There are more than 20 million gardens in the UK, so even the smallest grassy patches can add up to a significant proportion of land which, if managed properly, can deliver enormous gains for nature, communities and the climate.
Here are some of our favourite No Mow May-ers from 2024!
A beautiful No Mow May lawn, filled with Bulbous Buttercup and Meadow Saxifrage. Credit: David and Annette Beeson
No Mow May isn’t just for gardens, green spaces all over the community can take part. This cemetery in Suffolk has been boasting buttercups and Meadow Saxifrage. Credit: Alison Barnes
To help nature, you don’t have to leave your whole garden to grow wild. Keeping some areas of your lawn short can help flowers like daisies and dandelions, as well as an abundance of wildlife.
The explosion of colour No Mow May can create can be a haven for us, and for nature.
Green spaces left to grow wild have bloomed with daisies and dandelions, providing a feast for pollinators.
Even if you don’t have a garden, many parks around the country are leaving sections of green space to grow for No Mow May – just like this park in Wales.
Every year we call for people, communities and councils to get involved in #NoMowMay – and you still can this year.
Even though we’re approaching June, you can still join the movement and register your green space. This helps us to better understand how much green space across the UK is growing wild. So please sign up and help us give nature the boost it deserves in 2024 (you’ll even be added to our interactive No Mow May map!).
And the buzz doesn’t have to stop there. If you are able to, why not carry on and do Let it Bloom June.
Grassland wildlife comes in different flavours and incorporating different grass lengths into your garden can be wonderful for wildflowers and wildlife alike. Take a look at our top tips for building on the success of No Mow May.
As well as bringing back the bloom to our lawns, there are many ways you can get involved with No Mow May, even if you don’t have a garden.
If you want to create a home for wildlife in your garden, here’s a couple of nature-friendly gardening jobs to inspire you. If you create the right space, nature will come.
It’s not just wildflowers which benefit from not mowing our lawns this May. Pollinators and other wildlife bring our gardens to life!
It’s not just trees that capture and store carbon – our meadows and grasslands can play an important role too.
If you’re taking part in No Mow May this year, then your garden will be well on its way to becoming a beautiful, biodiverse haven for nature. But there is a bonus to helping the wildflowers grow – as you allow lawn to become meadow, your garden becomes your very own carbon store, helping to reduce your carbon footprint.
When carbon sequestration is mentioned, most minds turn to trees. As a society we are more aware than ever before of the role of woodlands in combatting climate change and creating a space for nature. Much less discussed is the remarkable and equally vital role our grasslands and meadows can play in increasing biodiversity and capturing and storing carbon from the atmosphere.
When we create healthy grasslands and meadows by mowing or grazing livestock, we are simply replicating the activity of the herds of large wild herbivores that once moved across our hills and valleys. These habitats – if the grazing is gentle, infrequent and low intensity – recreate prehistoric landscapes and provide a home for our wild plants, insects, birds and fungi. Natural and semi-natural grasslands (meaning those that are farmed but in a traditional, less intensive manner) improve the quality of our water, prevent flooding and help increase the resilience of farming to summer droughts.
This grassland – and the healthy soil beneath it – also has an incredible and little-known potential to lock away atmospheric carbon. Soil carbon is a particularly valuable store; it is far more stable and long lasting than the carbon in trees, which is vulnerable to forest fires, pests and disease.
As plants live and grow, carbon from the atmosphere is drawn down into the plants’ roots, where the myriad creatures in the soil make use of it, locking it away beneath the ground. As the diversity of plants on the surface increases, so does the diversity of microorganisms, fungi and invertebrates beneath it. The more diverse the soil life, the richer the entire ecosystem – and the more carbon the soil can store.
The almost mystical role of mycorrhizal fungi is now well known. They connect roots to the nutrients in the soil, trading sugars that plants and trees create from sunlight with locked away minerals the fungi extract from the soil. We now know that plants and trees can communicate through these fungal networks, alerting them to pests and diseases and passing nutrients to others in need.
Mycorrhizal fungi have another important role – they are critical in the ability of plants to transfer carbon to the soil. In areas of farmland, meadow and garden where the soil is ploughed, fertilised or dominated by a small number of grass species, these mycorrhizal networks are much less effective – with fewer species and a lower carbon storage potential. When we look after our farmland and gardens with care, mowing and grazing infrequently and gently, avoiding ploughing and pesticides, we nurture our mycorrhizal fungi, helping the soil to become a more potent carbon store.
By taking part in No Mow May, you will not only begin to create a home for wildflowers and insects, you will also create healthier soils that nourish your garden plants – and reduce your carbon footprint in the process.
England alone has around 640,000 hectares of private garden. If just a quarter of this area was transformed into wildflower rich meadow – by mowing just once or twice a year and collecting the cuttings – then these garden soils could potentially capture and store an additional amount of carbon equivalent to more than 3 million average cars’ annual emissions within a spade’s depth, and well over 10 million cars in soils as deep as one meter*.
Lawns and gardens are of course just one part of the puzzle – the UK’s farmed grassland landscape offers tremendous potential for us to sequester carbon, while also protecting agriculture and biodiversity.
Farmers and landowners have a fundamental role to play – combining food production with sustainable grasslands that lock away carbon in healthy, ecologically rich soils. Some 40% of the UK’s land area is grassland – but much of this is intensively farmed, limiting its potential for carbon storage.
Globally, studies have suggested that 2.3-7.3 billion tons of CO2 equivalents per year could be sequestered through grassland diversity restoration. Carbon sequestration doesn’t just mean more trees. Healthy grassland, with the more sensitive grazing and less intensive farming that nourishes it, also keeps carbon out of the atmosphere.
No matter how large or small our garden, we all have a role to play, and we can all make a difference. It’s easy to get started – just put your lawnmower away this May!
Thousands of people across the country have been letting it grow for #NoMowMay this year – and this is what it looks like!
Want to start a community meadow, but not sure where to begin?
Read our guide to creating a flower-filled haven for your local community.
Creating a meadow is a really simple way to bring the local community together, whilst doing something positive for nature.
You don’t need to be an expert to start one – we’ve shared our tips for how to begin, what to plant, how to manage your green space year-round and how to engage the community.
So, what are community meadows? They are areas, predominantly of grassland, that are owned and managed by the community, such as parks, road verges, school grounds, village greens, church land or fields.
Read more: How to grow a wildflower meadow
Now you’ve decided to try and start a community meadow, it’s hard to know where to begin. We’ve got plenty of experience and advice to help you along the way.
Contact your local council – Whether it’s parish, town or district council, reaching out to your local decision makers to promote wildlife-friendly management can make a big difference. Local support can really help to bring about change, whether that’s through a volunteer group or social media page. Check out our Good Meadows Guide for some convincing arguments.
Positive perceptions – Some people might be concerned that not cutting a greenspace as regularly might make it look neglected and untidy. But, framing a greenspace by cutting narrow strips around the wildflower area can offset some negative perceptions. Other concerns about plant height for road safety can be tackled by growing shorter species, which can still support an array of pollinators such as clovers, trefoils, Selfheal and Yarrow.
Communicating at every step – Telling people what and why you are creating a meadow is crucial for understanding. By bringing the community with you and working together, it will be easier to explain the benefits of meadow making. You could write something in the local magazine, talk about your meadow-making journey on social media or put up a sign.
Community activities – Bringing the community together to help create a meadow can be very beneficial. You can run activities, join campaigns or hold events to gather momentum.
Clover in a hay meadow
Three Hagges Woodmeadow in Yorkshire
A pink orchid growing from green grass in a meadow
If you need some help funding your community meadow, these places might be able to offer support:
We hope that this helps you in creating a wonderful community meadow. Do let us know on social media when you have tried these methods and your progress in creating a meadow by tagging us.
Are you feeling inspired, but not sure where to start? Aside from Plantlife’s guidance, a great source of knowledge and personal support can be from meadow groups. A huge variety of groups exist across the country, who manage meadows for hay, livestock or community benefits. These groups could also be good places to start when searching for local seeds or advice.
If you would like to add your community meadow group to our list, please get in touch here.
It's been 25 years since a local campaign helped save Skylark Meadows.
Whether it’s your back garden, local park, community field or lawn, wildflower meadows are amazing spaces with so much to offer.
Made up of wildflowers and grasses that return every year, they can bring benefits to people, climate and a huge array of wildlife.
Meadows come to life in the spring and summer, bursting with vibrant wildflowers and buzzing with insects and animals. But species-rich grassland areas, which used to occur commonly throughout Britain, are now amongst the most threatened habitats in the UK.
Approximately 97% of wildflower meadows have been lost across the UK since the 1930s. That’s why wildflowers and meadows are not only beautiful staples of the British countryside, but also crucial habitats that need restoring.
Why are meadows so amazing?
WATCH: Not just a pretty space, this is a living space
So, the more areas that can be turned into wildflower meadows, the better things get for nature.
No matter the size of your land, the process of making a wildflower meadow is pretty much the same. Follow these steps to start your meadow-making journey:
Before sowing seed, in late summer or autumn, you must cut the grass as short as possible. The cuttings must then be removed because most meadow species thrive in nutrient-poor soil with low fertility levels. Leaving the cuttings on the grass to rot down, both stifles delicate seedlings, and adds nutrients.
This can easily be done using a strimmer or mower and the cuttings removed with a rake.
It is really important to control any problem plants that could prevent your meadow from thriving. For example, species such as Nettle, Creeping Thistle and Dock can rapidly spread and crowd wildflowers in poorly managed meadows.
To stop this, it is best to pull these plants out by hand, cut their heads before they set seed or spot spray them. Bramble and scrub will also need to be controlled before creating a meadow.
If you have lots of problem plants, it will be easier (if possible) to try and create a meadow on another piece of land.
Meadow on Dartmoor
Orchids in a meadow
A #NoMowMay garden
Bare ground is simply an area that has no plants living in it. It provides germination gaps and growing space for meadow flowers and grasses. Having about 50-70% of land as bare ground will increase your chances of creating a wildflower meadow.
This can be done by hand with vigorous raking, strimming or using a rented garden scarifier.
Sprinkle and gently trample in your seeds, which can be mixed with sand for easier spreading. During drier spells, water the ground if possible, but do not wash away the seeds.
Then, over the next few months pull up any Creeping Thistle and Dock or cut the flower heads off and remove before they set seed (these can spread fast and smother wildflowers).
Knowing a bit about your soil can also really help you to choose which seeds to sow. There are many factors that can influence what will grow including the soil type, fertility, location, weather, availability of light and what’s already growing there.
Don’t worry if your meadow looks a bit plain in its first year, many perennials take at least a couple of years to establish.
We hope that these tips help you in creating a wonderful meadow. Do share your meadow-making journey with us on social media by tagging us.
No Mow May
In May 2023 thousands of you liberated your lawn for nature during No Mow May, leaving the wildflowers to grow and providing a space for nature, from inner cities to remote rolling hills.
But what does a No Mow May lawn look like at the end of the month? Take a look at the pictures this year’s participants sent in!
With 1 in 5 British wildflowers under threat it is more important than ever to change the way we mow our lawns.
These wildflower stuffed lawns show that in over just a month, your grassy spaces can be a lifeline for wildlife. This gallery shows that people, wild plants, and pollinators alike can live side by side in a thriving green space.
Shorter flowering lawns are a haven for daisies and dandelions, whereas longer patches allow taller plants like Oxeye Daisies and Musk Mallow to bloom.
A No Mow May lawn can be beautiful as well as a refuge for wildlife. This sunny sea of buttercups from Samantha Barnes shows just how striking our wild plants are.
A short flowering lawn is a hardy and practical space, even when you need to nip to the shed for your bike! Image by Judy Manson
You can let wildflower grow tall even in a small patch of lawn in your garden, image by Jane Wood
Having a No Mow lawn doesn’t mean no fun! A flowering lawn provides the perfect spot for the next generation of nature lovers to discover the joy of the great outdoors. Image by Tina Radford
Taking part in No Mow May is a wonderful addition to any nature-friendly gardeners calendar. Long grass surrounding a pond can help provide space for amphibians. Image by Zoe Costello
This creative window display at a school is an inspiring reminder that caring for our wild plants is important to all generations. Image by Laura Churchill
A green oasis in a city centre. Allowing a diversity of plants to grow has the potential to improve the carbon capture potential of soil beneath our lawns by as much as 10%. Image by Kenneila Quashie
No Mow May participants reported sightings of many beneficial pollinators in their gardens, from bees to dragonflies. Image by Fiona Hobbs
Did your local council embrace No Mow May? 30+ councils let us know that they were allowing plants like Cuckooflower, a food plant of the Orange Tip Butterfly, to bloom. Image by Michael MacCuish
No Mow May doesn’t stop at your garden fence. Whole towns and cities bloomed with wildflower as councils and communities let their green spaces grow.
Schools embraced the magic of wild plants with beautiful signs and window displays, sewing the seed for future No Mow May’s that are bigger and wilder than ever before.
Watch the latest No Mow May results sent to us on our YouTube channel, and stay tuned for the latest updates as we head into our wildest summer yet.
By letting us know if you or your community space is taking part, you’ll be added to our map showcasing the collective power that this campaign has.Now sit back and watch the wildflowers grow…
From citizen science, to volunteering and from making space for nature to forging a deeper connection with it – conservation is for everyone.
Mark Schofield
Congratulations – we’ve reached the end of No Mow May! On behalf of your wildflowers and pollinators, thank you for breaking with convention and for re-imagining your lawns and your local green spaces.
But the buzz doesn’t have to stop there…why not leave a space in your garden for nature to continue to bloom this June? From different grass lengths, how to look out for wildlife and how to mow (if you want to) – follow our expert advice to build on the success of #NoMowMay.
By not mowing in May you have rekindled your wildflowers and thrown a much-needed lifeline to your pollinators. Hopefully you can already see the difference you’ve made and are pleased with the results (we know we are!).
Now the growth season moves into June, things don’t have to get messy or overgrown and you can still maintain a space for your local wildlife. If you’re wondering what to do or concerned about your mower not being able to cope – we have some ideas about how you can build on your success while keeping things under control! But importantly, your lawn or open space is your canvas and you hold the paintbrush.
You now have an opportunity to design your wildflower landscape. Grassland wildlife comes in different flavours and you could incorporate these different elements into your plan.
You might need to keep your paths and recreation areas mown short but perhaps you could frame these functional areas with a flowering lawn mown once every 4 to 8 weeks. This allows common, low-growing wild flowers to regrow and reflower throughout the summer while you maintain a shorter, neater height. Picture a carpet of red and white clovers, golden trefoils, puddles of blue selfheal and the white froth of yarrow. You will find that even in the fiercest droughts, the wildflowers will stay green and keep flowering while grasses fall dormant and turn brown.
If you are feeling bolder you might want to trial leaving some of your open space unmown for longer. By mowing only twice a year outside of April to July you could try to recreate the effect of a traditional hay meadow. This allows taller growing flowers such as red campions, purple knapweeds and mauve scabious to grace your space with a more dynamic swirl of colours animated by a summer breeze. You can picture this flavour of grassland as a perennial, herbaceous border you never need to weed feed or water. It holds more value for wildlife because when left undisturbed for longer, wildflowers and grasses can support the lifecycles of those invertebrates that depend upon them.
The more adventurous among you may want to take it to the next stage around the boundary of your plot. Grassland left unmown won’t support so many wildflowers but will provide vital sanctuary for wildlife during hot summers and cold winters. Tussocks of grass and tall herbs will develop, and this structure is a great way to provide another niche for wildlife that complements the more flower-rich areas. Such sanctuary strips need only be a few feet wide at the base of your hedgerow and they only require a minimum of management when you snip out woody saplings or the bramble gets too much. You will be providing vital protection for toads and voles while seedheads will act as natural bird feeders for visiting finches.
Leaving borders to grow supports a wealth of wildflower and wildlife
By the end of No Mow May, your garden lawn may also look like this!
Creating a patchwork of lawn lengths in your garden can support a range of wildflowers
Some of the tools Mark uses in June to manage his lawn
If your grassy growth has gotten away from you, don’t panic. Not all mowers can cope with tall vegetation but most can if you mow in two stages.
Firstly, check your lawn for wildlife – and never mow around the edges towards the centre, this leaves no escape route for wildlife. Instead, as you mow, progress gradually towards sanctuary areas such as uncut grass strips at boundaries.
Next, set the blades as high as possible then mow strips only half as wide as the mower. This will reduce the load on the mower’s engine and make the job easier. You can then re-pass as normal with blades set lower to finish the job. Alternatively, if you have one, a strimmer can be a better way to tackle a taller sward.
This will prevent the build-up of cuttings which can stifle the regrowth of wildflowers. With no cuttings to rot back down into the soil, it will also help to reduce the fertility of the soil. More fertility gives the advantage to your grass over your flowers. This produces a lush green lawn but it will be much less colourful and much less valuable for wildlife.
If collecting up or raking off your cuttings seems like more work, remember that you are actually saving effort by managing some zones less frequently. This means that you don’t have to mow everywhere all at once every time. In fact, by removing the cuttings each time you cut, fertility will reduce each year meaning that regrowth will be less and less each year. That means you won’t need to cut so often in the future so you can save yourself the effort, reduce your carbon footprint and enjoy the wildlife! Wilder lawns also capture and lock away more carbon in the soil, so you will be doing your bit for the climate too.
You can use cuttings to mulch your vegetable beds to suppress weeds, retain soil moisture and add fertility where you want it. Composting is also a great way to recycle your cuttings with other organics into soil you can use next season.
Some wildlife may have taken refuge in your liberated lawn. Here are some quick tips for keeping wildlife safe while you mow:
Ultimately, it’s your lawn and your choice – to manage as you wish. You can rekindle wildflowers from those that are already present and the seeds that have remained naturally dormant in the soil. You might also consider introducing some native perennial wildflower seed or native perennial wildflower plants this autumn. We will have more advice on this later in the year.
However you choose to enjoy your new wildlife area, we wish you every success. Now that you have added a little more colour to the world, we hope you are rewarded with the fizz of grasshoppers, the delight of birdsong and a space that dances with butterflies and buzzes with pollinators.
If you are seeing different flowers grow, and new species appearing in your lawn please share the good news with us. Share your pictures, videos and stories by tagging us on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
Here we delve into this mind-boggling realm to discover ten of weirdest, wackiest and most wonderful facts from the world of fungi!
Horticultural businesses, major retailers and NGOs have come together to call on the government to legislate to end peat sales.
Often when people think about autumnal colours, their first thought is the trees – but we can't stop looking at the colourful displays of our other wild plants and fungi!
Artificial lawns are becoming an increasingly common sight as we walk through our local neighbourhoods.
But what is the impact on the environment and our wildlife with this new plastic grass carpeting our communities?
Tragically, approximately 97% of Britain’s wildflower meadows have been destroyed since the 1930s.
This makes the loss of remaining grasslands – whether the garden lawn or on the road verge – even more important for wildflowers, insects and other wildlife. Flower-rich lawns carpeted in daisies, buttercups and clover provide a bounty of pollen and nectar for pollinators who simply cannot survive in a plastic environment.
With more than 20 million gardens in the UK, artificial grass in our gardens is an opportunity lost for nature’s recovery.
While there is a time and place for artificial grass in, for example, high performance sports pitches in towns and cities, when it comes to gardens you simply can’t beat the real thing. Grassland habitats such as garden lawns are home to thousands of wild plants that, in turn, support a wonderful wealth of other wildlife.
Using the latest estimates, an artificial lawn of 60sqm for an average urban garden will create about 435kg CO2e of greenhouse gas emissions through the plastic manufacturing process.
Simply by leaving your lawn as real grass and introducing less frequent mowing, you’re reducing the carbon emissions of your lawn. You’ll also be creating a habitat by allowing wildflowers to flourish, which have the potential to absorb even more carbon into our soil for the future.
Artificial turf also adds to the heat island effect; this is when often urban areas become hotter than rural areas, which is amplified during heatwaves. As well as being too hot to enjoy in summer, micro-plastic shedding artificial lawns are difficult to recycle – a problem we don’t want to be leaving future generations to deal with.
Artificial grass is not just to the detriment of wildlife but to us, too; children can’t make a daisy-chain on a plastic lawn.
The increasing popularity of artificial grass underlines how disconnected we are becoming from the natural world around us. Polling undertaken by YouGov for Plantlife revealed that 80% of people couldn’t name Common Dog-violet which grows in 97% of the UK, and only 11% of 16-24 year-olds felt confident they could name wild flowers. Given this steep decline in knowledge and appreciation which is also reflected in further education, it is perhaps little wonder that many of us feel comfortable with artificial ‘low maintenance’ solutions, despite warnings about global plastic pollution.
The answer is simple – a real grass lawn is best for nature.
For those lucky enough to have a garden or access to green space, with living grass and wildflowers, they can prove a wonderful place to reconnect with nature if managed for people and wildlife. While our gardens need to work well for all – more frequently mown areas provide functional zones for children to kick a ball or people to unwind on a deckchair – that doesn’t mean they cannot also play home to wildlife – from finches feeding on seed-heads to slow worms slithering in the grass. Areas of infrequently mown turf are win-win. They require little maintenance and offer opportunities for so many species of plants and other wildlife.
No Mow May looks to highlight the positive steps that people can take to make space for nature. At a time when people may feel disconnected or disempowered in the face of the climate and biodiversity crisis, individual actions add up to a community network of wilder lawns. Connected habitats are exactly what our wild plants, fungi and wildlife need to thrive.
We can’t wait to see your blooming wonderful communities this No Mow May!
A rainbow of wildflowers in your lawn doesn’t just bring garden owners joy, but it is also the sign of a healthy and thriving garden.
Learn how to increase the number of wildflowers appearing in your lawn this year with our expert guidance.
Different flowers provide different resources for different wildlife species. Clover on a short flowering lawn provides a lifeline for bumblebees, long grasses provide an essential resource for butterflies and moths such as the Small Skipper, and Goldfinches are attracted to Knapweed when it sets seed.
But how do you increase the diversity of plants in your garden? Here are some tips from Plantlife’s wildflower experts to help you create a blooming bonanza!
They are some of the first lawn flowers to appear each year and provide much needed food to early bees and other pollinators when there is little else out in flower. Sparrows also enjoy feasting on their seeds as a tasty snack.
Meg Griffiths
Calan Mai, the Welsh celebration of summer on May 1st, revives the importance of seasonal living and reminds us that our lives have always been connected with the yearly cycles of plant abundance.
At Plantlife, there is a buzz of activity brewing as the 1st of May approaches. No Mow May is our biggest campaign – calling on all parts of society to join in a national movement to create thriving green spaces.
We focus the campaign on May because it’s in May that the flowering season really gets going. Leaving areas of grass unmown in May lets the flowers multiply, better supporting wildlife over the summer. We might be the ones driving No Mow May today, but the seasonal relevance of May 1st has roots much deeper than any modern campaign can claim.
Calan Mai or Calan Haf (meaning First day of May or First day of Summer) was a special day of celebration for Welsh people. In certain places it still is. This festival has ancient origins, sharing cultural roots with May Day, Beltane and the European Walpurgis Night. Regardless of their differences, these festivals are united in a shared celebration of the returning sunshine. The arrival of the sun encourages plant growth, and therefore carries the promise of plentiful food.
During Calan Mai, people would traditionally dance, sing, and feast to celebrate the summer after a cold and barren winter. The village green (‘Twmpath chwarae’) would be officially opened, where people would gather to dance, perform and play sports. ‘Twmpath’ refers to a mound that would be prepared on the green. This would be decorated with branches of oak trees, and a fiddler or harpist would sit upon it, playing music in the evening sun.
Our ancestors were deeply connected to nature’s phases. So much so that important dates in the seasonal calendar were considered sacred and even magic. Many of the festivities and traditions of Calan Mai are based in spirituality and botanical folklore.
On Ysprydnos (May eve, one of the Welsh ‘spirit nights’, when the veil between this world and the next is said to be thinner) locals would collect branches and flowers to decorate their homes, celebrating and welcoming growth and fertility. Fires would be burned to ward off harmful spirits, and young men would place bunches of rosemary tied with white ribbon on the windowsills of those they admired.
The festival also marks a special point in the agricultural calendar. This is the time that Welsh farmers would turn their herds out to pasture. These kinds of customs remind us that, until fairly recently, a knowledge of how plants, animals, and landscapes change with the seasons was deeply engrained in cultural norms.
Nowadays, with central heating, electricity and food readily available all year-round, we’ve become detached from the turn of the planet. We observe and experience the seasons passing, but for many, harsh winters are nothing more than an inconvenience (although this is far from true for everyone). It’s hard for us to imagine the enormous significance the start of summer had, and continues to have, on people who rely directly on the land for their survival.
Remembering Calan Mai and engaging with movements like No Mow May allow us to reconnect with the seasons. They remind us to tune into the habits of the Earth and become familiar again with the blooms and busts of nature. It also nurtures our own physical and mental wellbeing. Although we might forget it sometimes, we are creatures who have evolved in a world that changes with the seasons. When we appreciate how reliant we are on our planet and everything it provides us it becomes clear that the start of summer really is something worth singing and dancing for.
Agricultural grasslands dominate Wales’ rural landscape. Finding ways to restore species-rich habitats to farms is a priority for Plantlife Cymru.
Chris Jones, the Warden of Kenfig National Nature Reserve, recently found the very rare fungus, during a routine survey.
Every day, our wild plants and fungi are put at risk from planning decisions, chemical sprays and more. Find out what you can do to help protect nature.
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