Intensive Farming Threatens Native Plant Species

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Tuesday, 10 May 2005

Hundreds of native plants and flowers in Britain are at risk of extinction, according to a new audit.

The alert for one in five members of the British flora is signalled by botanists who have completed the first serious study in 40 years. Among favourite species threatened is the corn buttercup, which was once widespread but now is found only in a tiny number of areas from Norfolk to Oxfordshire.

Another is the purple milk-vetch, which is still found in sand dunes, but which has all but disappeared from the chalk grasslands of southern England.

The plants are named in a new “Red List” of flora at risk of extinction. It is the first time that such a list has been attempted and experts are alarmed because many of the species had previously not been thought to be under threat. For example, there are only 11 plants of Western juniper left in Britain, yet it has never been listed as at risk. Other plants once widespread, such as butterfly orchids, have suffered.

The aim is to persuade ministers to allot more money to be spent to protect vital habitats. A review of the Government Biodiversity Action Plan is to take place shortly and experts are to press for this decline to be remedied.

Chris Cheffings, the plants adviser at the Joint Nature Conservation Committee, said: “My parents’ farm was one of the last sites in Lincolnshire for corn buttercups; alas, that has all gone. I grew up seeing purple milk-vetch on the roadside; this is now, by and large, gone.”

Dr Cheffings said that she found it shocking that so many species were on the Red List and she wants ministers to tackle overgrazing in uplands. She is convinced that with different farming practices and fewer sheep and cattle, some of the decline can be reversed.

In the lowlands, some plants were clinging to tiny patches such as roadside verges. She said: “Eventually, these will be unable to cope and will start to suffer. There is not sufficient genetic diversity in tiny plots of land.” The loss of meadows and wetlands areis also blamed.

About 1,000 volunteers, members of the Botanical Society of the British Isles, took part in the two-year surveillance. Their findings showed that 345 out of a total of 1,756 different species are threatened. The Red List was also compiled with experts from Plantlife, the conservation charity; the Biological Records Centre; and the Natural History Museum.

Source: The Times Valerie Elliott, Countryside Editor