Raising my spirits

I'd been feeling a bit low after my return from Romania. The appalling weather hadn't helped, with seemingly endless rain, but I was also pining for the huge expanses of species-rich meadows that still exist over much of the country. Somehow Britain seemed so very impoverished in comparison.

But today the sun shone, and though it was still cool and a bit breezy, I visited Robert's Field, one of the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust's grassland restoration sites. The Trust has had a one acre meadow reserve here, under a management agreement with the Forestry Commission, since 1985. The remainder of the site, which was formerly limestone grassland, was planted with conifers in the 1960s despite its SSSI status and the Trust's efforts to save it. The remaining portion of a long lease was purchased from the Forestry Commission in 1991. The Trust embarked on a plan to restore Roberts's Field to limestone grassland in 1994. The conifer trees were felled and the roots dug up and burnt. The ground was levelled and re-seeded with hay seeds from local limestone grassland. 

Current grassland management comprises of a mixture of hay cutting and sheep grazing, and this has resulted in a wonderfully colourful and species-rich sward, with large populations of Yellow-rattle, Common Spotted-orchid and many other species. 

Robert's Field was also a renowned site for butterfly species in the 1950s and many of these have now returned - I was fortunate to see a Dark-green Fritillary, though by the time I got close enough for a photograph it had flown, whisked away by the breeze.