Haslemere Museum Garden and Grounds

The History of Meadows and Grasslands

The passing of the traditional hay meadows with their rich tapestry of plants has been one of results of the improvement in farming practices. After the First and Second World wars governments were looking for security of food production and farming grants were given to those who improved their land. This was done in the case of grassland by selecting those native grasses that cattle and other grassland feeding animals preferred.

Annual meadow grass Cocks foot and Rye grasses all yield large amounts of herbage that cattle and sheep liked. This enabled more animals to be raised per hectare, these single species grasslands were called leys and they became widespread. Although these were grasses that existed together with many others in the old hay meadows, the feeding of regular doses of fertilizers ensured that these flourished.

The development of selective herbicides enabled farmers to destroy all or many of the unwanted species so keeping the leys as monocultures or mixtures of those grass species beneficial to them and their stock. Others like the Common Quaking grass that animals found unpalatable were destroyed. This resulted in enormous changes in meadows, gone were the rich mixtures of plants that in turn supported large numbers of insect species on which other life forms depended.

There were large declines in farmland breeding birds and mammals and coupled with the trend towards larger farm units, the traditional meadows were soon only five percent of the total grassland.

Traditional Meadows

Many of the traditional meadow grasses are nutritious to livestock and have been isolated and sown as grass leys to support sheep and cattle. Annual meadow grass, common meadow grass and others such as rye grass and cocks foot are all examples of these. Their vigour though denies the less vigorous. The vetches, oxe-eye daisy and meadow sweet all find it difficult to compete. The new grass leys are treated with fertilizer to stimulate their growth further. This is one reason why these old meadows should not be fertilized regularly since it will upset the balance of species.

Meadows will vary in the plants they support. It depends on the soil type, its wetness and the amount of sunlight the meadow gets per day. This is particularly important for many species of animals, insects and plants, since many plants need sunshine to be able to reproduce. Reptiles need warm sunshine to raise their body temperatures before they can move and hunt for food. Plant seed heads need sunshine in order to ripen before the seed is dropped or distributed by wind or mammals.

It's fitting that the Museum should therefore actively manage the small meadow below the Museum lawn in order to recreate the rich flower meadows of the past years.