Rural: Nature Note
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Not before time, landowners in the Midlands have launched a mass attack on that noxious weed ragwort, which grows strongly on poor soil, and most noticeably on motorway embankments. While alive it is not much of a threat; it has a rather harsh smell, and is not attractive to herbivores. But once it is cut and wilting it becomes both palatable and highly toxic to cattle, sheep and horses, causing irreversible liver damage in any animal that eats a few pounds of it.
Ragwort has taken such a grip in Cheshire, Staffordshire and Shropshire that members of the Country Landowners' Association have started a campaign against it under the slogan "Rout Ragwort '98", supported by the Highways Agency, English Nature and various county councils. The weed is by no means easy to eradicate, for a single plant can produce 150,000 seeds, which are distributed by the wind and can lie dormant in the soil for up to 20 years before they germinate.
Young plants can be knocked out with herbicides, but spraying is liable to exterminate desirable wild flowers as well, and fields treated with weedkillers cannot be used for grazing for several weeks. Cutting is useless, because the ragwort's roots just grow again more strongly. The best answer is the most laborious - to pull or dig plants out one by one, roots and all, and then to burn every scrap.
Duff Hart-Davis
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments