A trip out to the coast for 4 of us to help Natural England with some green hay scattering. The weather was kind to us, with only one rain shower just after lunch and it was warm when the sun escaped from the clouds so we took the day at a leisurely pace.
John the warden cut us a sizeable section of long grass, rich in wild
flowers which we set about raking up and chucking onto a trailer.
Next, we climbed aboard for a trip to a nearby field recently bought by LWT.
This area was rich in grass but poor in wild flowers so the scattering of
the fresh cut grass would hopefully introduce the flowers to the field.
John told us an interesting story (one of many!) about the RAF base at Donna nook who had built a new helicopter landing pad on the dunes and paid a company lots of tax payers money to reseed the area around the pad. As John had forewarned them, the seeds germinated on the sand at the first rain shower, then fried & died when the sun came out. John offered his green hay scattering method which they sceptically accepted and a healthy ground cover was re-established within weeks. So, the method works.
The grass is cut fresh, before the seeds start dropping, and spread
immediately over the new area. Judging by the amount of seed left in
the bottom of the trailer (not to mention lots of interesting fauna!), the
seeds soon start dropping. The grass also protects the seed for a
while after it has fallen to ground. The field contained a flock of sheep,
but apparently they don't like hay, which explains why you sometimes see
sheep winter grazing in grassless fields munching on turnips!
Anyway, we repeated the exercise a couple of times in other areas and had finished by 2.30, but then Richard suggested John cut another section (doh!), but at least I got a go on the big hay cutter machine (wohoo!). We finished the day with a trip to Rimac to see a Marsh Helleborine!
Julian