One man went to mow: Our beautiful meadow heritage and its wildife is under threat says Monty, so let's do our bit to create habitats in our gardens

摘要

The border between gardens,farms and 'natural' landscape has always meandered, but it is becoming increasingly blurred.This is due as much to the huge differences between modern farming and gardening as the similarities. It is said that nothing has been more damaging to the planet's delicate ecosystems than agriculture and, since the second world war, modern farming practice has been nothing short of disastrous for the wildlife of Britain.Some efforts are being made now to repair the damage but in most cases it is far too little, far too late. The RSPB estimates that our population of corn buntings fell by 89 per cent between 1970 and 2003. They say we lost over half of our skylarks in asimilar period and the turtle dove is now England's most threatened farmland bird. Hedgehogshave almost completely been eradicated from the countryside. But the most shocking figure is that we have lost 97 per cent of our meadow sites since the 1930s.