On the Verge
Last month we talked about how the On the Verge is helping to connect people and wildlife in our green corridors. Some of our green spaces looked wonderful this year! Beautiful pollinator mixes in Crouch Gardens and Micklefield Park, bees and butterflies on the longer grass in the slopes in the Salts, a chorus of grasshoppers on Southdown Corner, and a whole array of plants, insects, birds and more, in the fields near the ‘Covers’ in College Road, to name just a few. Seaford individuals and residents’ groups are starting to care for and ‘rewild’ their local green spaces and gardens, as even the tiniest space can be a haven for wildlife. We’ve been able to connect people so they can share ideas, enthusiasm, seeds and plants. If you’d like support in rewilding your green space or garden, please get in touch and pledge your ‘metre square for wildlife’. We worked with Buglife to encourage people to monitor the number of pollinators in Seaford so we can measure whether our efforts will make a real difference. We have started detailed wildflower surveys, and started to analyse this data, to better understand the value of our green spaces, and improvements that
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would help biodiversity. Following one survey we’re applying to get the Edinburgh Road wildlife verges extended to the whole road, and to improve the variety of plants in the bank at the top. In our Saltwood Road pilot ‘Nature Street’, residents were recently involved with raking grass cuttings away and planting yellow rattle (which weakens the grass and increases the number of wildflowers in the verges), and planting bulbs which provide nectar for bees early in the year. In the Maurice Road ‘Nature Street’, local residents themselves took all the initiatives, including asking neighbours to leave their verges unmown, carrying out a very detailed and enlightening verge survey, and writing leaflets. Their new ‘botany’ group now has plans to try and get neighbouring streets on board too. We plan to extend the pilot schemes in coming years – could your street be our next Nature Street? We are a friendly bunch, so if you are still sitting on that verge, do take a step in our direction, and come along to our meetings and events. Maybe you can help by talking to your neighbours about verges and growing wildlife-friendly plants in their garden. They could join Seaford residents who together have pledged over 9,000 square metres of their gardens to be wildlife friendly! With your help we really are on the verge of great change! https://www.seafuture.org/a-metre-square-for-wildlife/ https://www.seafuture.org/on-the-verge/ Photos from top: Botanist Sarah takes a close look at one of the clovers in the Pump field; Cheery flowers planted by residents in nearby Millberg Road; Insect counting and identification at the Salts.
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