On the 6th August we completed our seed harvesting for 2025. This year the season kicked off earlier than usual, with the prolonged warm dry weather having us rush to harvest seed before landowners brought the hay in early from their parched fields.
A total of 5 sites were harvested this year, with approximately 8ha of flower-rich sward covered by our brush-seed harvester, and a total of 668kg collected.
This seed-rich harvest is now dry and awaiting suitable conditions for spreading onto 23.5ha of species-poor grassland at 10 sites across Herefordshire and the Malvern Hills National Landscape. These sites make up approximately 1/4 of Herefordshire Meadows restoration works for 2025, with the remainder being carried out using seed supplied by Ecohab Wildflowers.
A list of species contained in each harvest will be provided to restoration site owners so that they have an idea of what they can look forward to identifying over the coming years. 60 broad-leaved plants appear on the species lists, including 29 indicators of Lowland Meadow Priority Habitat, the most commonly harvested being Common bird’s-foot trefoil, Black knapweed, Yellow rattle, Oxeye daisy, and Meadow vetchling.
After a 2024 harvest containing little to no Bird’s-foot trefoil, this year provided a bumper crop of trefoil that we hope will take well at the restoration sites, and overall the yield this year was good, with grass having taken a greater hit by the weather conditions than deep rooting broad-leaved plants. A grassy sward creates competition for broad-leaved plants and also makes conditions difficult for our brush-seed harvester, so despite the challenging heat and dusty harvest this year we had a good haul of wildflower seed.
Many thanks to this year’s donor site owners for helping us to create more wonderful meadows across the region!
Every year we are on the lookout for flower-rich swards to act as donor sites for meadow restoration works, so please get in touch if you think your meadow or one in your area might be suitable!
