FUTURE FLORA
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WITHER BOTANY? PLANTS MAY BUT BOTANY GOES FROM STRENGTH TO STRENGTH DAVID BELLAMY (READ BY MARTIN HARPER – CHAIR OF MORNING SESSION) A few days ago on an unusually warm autumn afternoon I had the immense pleasure to walk across the South Downs with David Streeter and visit the area in which his famous 25 plants per 25 square centimetre plot is situated. They were still there despite the threat of global warming and the close presence of Brachypodium pinnatum. Yes the botany of the British Isles is under threat and thank God we still have more field botanists per square yard than any other country to chart the trends and changes. Long live the B.S.B.I. and the Wildflower Society that do that job year after year. Long live Plantlife who campaigns in the most positive way by conserving habitats which are the cradle of biodiversity and by working with governments at all levels. On the action front I believe our most important mission for the future is to put teeth into conservation legislation at all levels; link existing habitats of all types with stepping stones and corridors so that as the global greenhouse waxes and wanes there are corridors of advance and retreat. Only last year right here in Suffolk the wildlife trusts signed up with Railtrack to work with them to manage their estate to that end. Not long before we celebrated the rehabilitation of the Redgrave fen complex, where Francis Rose first showed me Liparis loeselii. This was the first time a public water supply had been moved in the cause of conservation. There are of course immense problems, eutrophication, overgrazing, feral plants, feral animals and feral housing estates. I wish the meeting well and am sorry that I can’t be with you to join your learning curve and make you all sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Francis Rose for he is 80 years young and still out there heading the field.
Trans. Suffolk Nat. Soc. 38 (2002)