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Where have all the flowers gone? - the decline of hay meadows
'There was a time when meadow, grove and stream, The earth and every common sight, To me did seem Apparelled in celestial light, It is not now as it hath been of yore:- Turn wheresoe'er I may, By night or day, The things which I have seen I now can see no more.' Wordsworth Nationally, 97% of flower-rich hay meadows have been lost between the 1930s and the mid 1980s. This was due to agricultural intensification after World War Two, with more land being improved to produce crops, and more recently to produce silage as winter animal feed. Click here to find out more about silage production and how it compares to hay making. Improved grassland is the term applied when fields are ploughed and reseeded with fast growing grass species which out grow or 'out compete' the wild flowers. Chemical fertilisers are applied to encourage grass growth or 'productivity', but often kill off wild flowers which find the improved soils too rich in nutrients to survive. In the Peak District, the Hay Meadows Project found a 76% loss or decline in hay meadows between the mid 1980s and mid 1990s; and a further 26% loss and/or decline from 1995 to 1998.
This graph illustrates the decline of some of the Peak District's key hay meadow species. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
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