A meadow and a quarry

I wasn’t planning anything today apart from admin for various projects. But mid morning I got a text from Helen who I know from Dursley Green Drinks. One of her clients has a wildflower meadow which they want to develop some more.

It wasn’t very far away so I drove down to take a look. The owner Colin had established it 20 years ago using a commercial company.

It was in pretty good shape species wise, although there was a lot of dominant grasses and wild carrot.

We talked about the management and possible seed strategies. They were doing a late hay cut and removing material (which is ideal), but they weren’t doing one in early season – say end March, early April to simulate grazing. It could definitely use some meadow grasses. Yellow rattle, knapweed and field scabious would be good additions too.

This farm is also home to the only quarry in the area. In fact, I have their stone in the wall outside my house. So it was interesting to see the quarry operations and the restoration they are doing to already quarried land to return it to agricultural use.