Thanks to a dedicated group of enthusiasts in North Yorkshire, wild flowers such as Venus’s looking glass, weasel’s snout, shepherd’s needle and the red hemp nettle are still thriving.
Without the dedication of the group the flowers would have died out years ago. The Cornfield Flowers Project, with the group embarked on a huge task of collecting seeds and nurturing them in places far from chemicals .
Ecologist Nan Sykes surveyed the Moors in 1988 and discovered that the flowers were on the verge on extinction. By that time many of the rare plants could not be seen in arable fields. An opportunity finally arose to do something about the situation 11 years later when the Carstairs Countryside Trust purchased 25 acres at Silpho near Scarborough with support from the North York Moors National Park Authority.
A nursery and demonstration field was also developed at Ryedale Folk Museum, Hutton-le-Hole near Kirkbymoorside . Here the public can see first hand how the Project is saving other rare plants from extinction.
Ian Carstairs, the former deputy chairman of the national park authority said, "What happens is that volunteers look out for these very rare plants and with the permission of the landowners they gather some seeds. We grow the seed on in the nursery to multiply it and then it is put out into the demonstration field at the museum where people can see it."
Any surplus plants are moved to Silpho to the land of ten farmers who work with the trust.
Mr Carstairs said, "The reason for that is that firstly, there are practicalities of geographic limits, but also it enables us to ensure that the seed that we have got is actually seed that is local and we are not bringing it in from far and wide. These plants are all examples that have existed locally.
"Mostly the plants still existed but we were down to literally handfuls in some instances. Some plants have not been seen for many years. We refuse to say they are extinct in the area we just like to describe them as not seen for a long time.
"In reality it has been proved. Some of these things are incredibly tiny, literally a couple of millimetres across the flowers, so until you have actually seen one you don't know what you are looking for."
A volunteer farmer who is now a part-time employee, Chris Wilson liaises with other farmers to establish growing sites on 50 farms that use marginal land.
Mr Carstairs said: "The work of our volunteers, including farmers, to save cornfield flowers is a spectacular example of taking local action for the future of wildlife . We hope the book and exhibition will help to bring attention to these scarce plants, helping to ensure they will always be part of our working countryside."
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Wild flowers thriving on the Moors
Wed, 28 Jun 2006
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