Meadow in a box

Our guest blogger today is Simon Whitworth, currently working as a Countryside Officer at Aberdeen City Council. His enthusiastic work to help pollinators has really caught the eye, and below is his story about the catchily named ‘Meadow in a box’.

Last autumn an idea grew in my head, planted there by some projects going on around me in Aberdeen City Council’s Environmental Services: Aberdeen B-lines, a change in grass cutting to encourage wildflowers, and an increased interest from schools in wildflowers and pollinators.

As Acting Countryside Officer, up from the ranks of the Aberdeen’s Countryside Rangers, I have increased powers of purchasing, and closer lines of communication with council higher-ups. I still don’t really know what a Performance and Development Manager does, or a Technical Officer, but I do know they’re useful people to ask about projects and how to generally ‘Get Things Done’.

Using my enhanced powers I thought I’d transform my box-based idea into an actual living thing, and that it should have a name. What better than something very literal (and I apologise to anyone who thought of this name first!)? So Meadow-in-a-Box was born, only without boxes or anything to make it a meadow.

Having decided that shop-bought planters were too expensive I decided to explore the world of the Scottish Prison Service, and secured an order for one hundred planters built by inmates of HMP Grampian, Peterhead, in their joinery workshop.

While more planters were in production, the first ten were collected and filled with compost by the gardening staff of Aberdeen City Council. The phrase ‘sturdy and rustic’ was used to describe the planters, and I like that description as it seemed appropriate to a wildflower meadow.

Filled with enthusiasm I set out to deliver the first ten Meadow-in-a-Box planters to Aberdeen City school early years settings. At the project’s genesis I’d emailed every head teacher in council-run schools, explaining my idea including its benefits for biodiversity, pollinators and the education of children in school nurseries. Evidently my pitch was put well, as more than thirty schools signed up their early years staff and pupils for a Meadow-in-a-Box.

So in May I delivered planters to ten schools and, at a few, had the pleasure of working with the children as they enthusiastically sowed wildflower seeds provided for free by Sarah Smyth of NatureScot.

The seed mix includes black knapweed, red clover, devil’s-bit scabious, ox-eye daisy, red clover, selfheal and yarrow, so provides a beautiful palette of red, white and purple. As I’m sure you know, each of these wildflower species is native to Scotland and great source of nectar for pollinators such as bumblebees, moths, hoverflies and butterflies.

As October unfolds into Autumnal weather, the Meadows-in-a-Box have seen full flowering as they painting playgrounds of ten schools with colour. The plants will be dying back now, marshalling their resources for growing next year.

In 2024 the first ten Meadows-in-a-Box will be joined by another thirty, located at more schools and also care homes and sheltered housing. Aberdeen will see a bit more colour among the grey granite buildings, contributing to the nectar value of the city and helping pollinators thrive between the streets and houses.

I have plans to grow Meadow-in-a-Box beyond Aberdeen so who knows: perhaps you’ll soon see a Meadow-in-a-Box near your house or workplace, with its attendant kaleidoscope of butterflies and bumblebees drifting amidst the wildflowers?

Adaptation prodigies

By Athayde Tonhasca

Most flowering plants depend on animals – typically insects – for their pollination and sexual reproduction, and pollinators are compensated for their services with floral resources such as pollen, nectar, oils and fragrances. These products are metabolically expensive, so plants use all sorts of devices to minimise consumption without risking their chances of fertilisation. They may lock their pollen inside anthers, so that only specialised bees can get to it by buzz-pollination; other species produce pollen or nectar that are toxic or hard to digest except by a select group of pollinators. Some plants, orchids in particular, offer no rewards of any kind and resort to sophisticated trickery such as sexual deception, which is the use of physical or chemical decoys to attract insects looking for a mating partner, or food deception, which is falsely advertising pollen or nectar with colour, scents, flower shape, and pollen-like structures. From 30 to 40% of the 28,000 or so known orchid species are deceitful: there’s a lot of cheating going on in the plant world. 

Bees and flies are the typical victims of these subterfuges, but Disa forficaria, a rare and endangered South African orchid, has an unusual target: a beetle. The flower releases a scent irresistible to male longhorn beetles (Chorothyse hessei), so much so that the passionate male tries to copulate with the flower, pollinating it in the process (Cohen et al., 2021: scroll down the paper’s page to watch the beetle in flagrante delicto).

L: Parts of a D. forficaria flower: petal (p), anther (a), dorsal sepal (ds), viscidium (v), stigma (s), labellum or lip (l) and lateral sepal (ls). R: C. hessei biting the petals and extending the tip of its abdomen into the labellum cleft. Scale bars = 5 mm. Images by C. Cohen, W.R. Liltved & S.D. Johnson © Cohen et al., 2021.

Resorting to sexual deception is especially important for D. forficaria because the species is quite rare; it relies on male beetles finding its flowers widely and thinly scattered in the landscape, while pseudocopulation assures the collection and transfer of pollen to another plant. A generalist pollinator would be less effective, which could spell disaster for the fragile orchid population.  

L: C. hessei with pollinaria of D. forficaria attached to it; R: A flower with pollen (arrow) adhering to the stigma immediately after a visit by C. hessei. Scale bars = 5 mm. Images by C. Cohen, W.R. Liltved & S.D. Johnson © Cohen et al., 2021.

While D. forficaria attracts its pollinators with fraudulent promises of sex, D. nivea resorts to impersonation. This rare orchid from South Africa’s Drakensberg region grows cheek by jowl with the unrelated Zaluzianskya microsiphon (family Scrophulariaceae), whose nectar-rich flowers are avidly visited and pollinated by the fly Prosoeca ganglbaueri. Plant and pollinator seem to have been made for each other, as Z. microsiphon flowers have long corollas and their fly visitor has a very long proboscis. 

P. ganglbaueri visiting the flowers of Z. microsiphon © Anderson et al., 2005.

But it so happens that flowers of both plant species look alike – or at least are similar enough for insects, whose eyes aren’t great for sharp image resolution. So, mistakes are inevitable: a P. ganglbaueri fly now and then sticks its proboscis inside an orchid flower, which has no nectar to offer. The fly goes way, often with a blob of pollen attached to its proboscis. If the fly gets it wrong again, it’s a score for the orchid: it gets pollinated (Anderson et al., 2005).  

A Z. microsiphon flower (bar = 20 mm) (L), and a D. nivea flower (bar = 13 mm) © Anderson et al., 2005.

Floral mimicry has been known for a long time: Christian Konrad Sprengel (1750-1816) spoke of Scheinsaftblumen (sham nectar flowers), and suggested their purpose was to deceive visitors. Many naturalists doubted that insects could be repeatedly fooled by such trickery. Darwin wrote that anyone who believes in ‘so gigantic an imposture’ must ‘rank the sense or instinctive knowledge of many kinds of insects, even bees, very low in the scale’. But insects do fall for it, and the chicanery seems to be working quite well for the orchid: its pollination rate in the Drakensberg region is linked to the abundance of Z. microsiphon.

A P. ganglbaueri posed next to a D. nivea flower. The fly is carrying two pollinaria of D. nivea at the base of its proboscis. Bar = 8 mm © Anderson et al., 2005. 

While D. nivea fools a fly, a related species from the Western Cape Province, D. ferruginea, targets a butterfly – the table mountain beauty (Aeropetes tulbaghia). This orchid produces no nectar, so it relies on the butterfly mistaking its red flowers for the blooms produced by nectar-rich Tritoniopsis triticea (family Iridaceae). But the orchid’s skulduggery goes further: it grows as an orange-flowered form in Langeberg, a mountain range in the Western Cape. The butterfly would be less easily fooled by red flowers, but here the orchid mimics the yellow-flowered and nectar-producing red-hot poker (Kniphofia uvaria, family Asphodelaceae) (Johnson, 1994).

The orchid D. ferruginea (L) and the iris T. triticea © Andrew massyn, Wikimedia Commons.

In South Africa, the table mountain beauty is hoodwinked by nectar-less red or yellow D. ferruginea orchids. Art by P. Cramer & C. Stoll, Wikimedia Commons.

Other Disa species play similar ruses by using some other elaborate adaptation – colour, scent or shape – to attract pollinators. But not all Disa orchids are swindlers: some species do offer nectar rewards to moths and other insects. And two species, D. chrysostachya and D.satyriopsis, have an unusual association with the malachite sunbird (Nectarinia famosa). These orchids produce small flowers tightly packed along a spike-shaped inflorescence. To get their nectar, the sunbird perches on the inflorescence; when it takes off, its feet will be covered with sticky pollen that, with luck, will be deposited on the receptive flowers of another orchid (Johnson & Brown, 2004).

A D. chrysostachya and its pollinator, the malachite sunbird © Alandmanson, and Steve Garvie, respectively. Wikimedia Commons.

There are over 180 Disa species, with about 120 of them in South Africa’s Cape region. Most are pollinated by a single group of insects, which could be butterflies, moths, long-tongued flies, carpenter bees, mason bees, wasps, and a bird; some species self-pollinate. Johnson et al. (1998) identified 19 specialized pollination systems for 27 Disa species: who knows how many more are yet to be discovered.

These unassuming orchids have evolved a remarkable range of features involving sexual deception, food deception, shapes, colours, and scents – all adaptations to reproduce and survive. We may not see such an array of strategies from the plants we are familiar with, but they certainly will have gone through some adaptive fine-tuning with their own flower visitors. Plants and their pollinators offer us some of the best examples of the power of natural selection.

Natural selection in action: each of the 18 or so species of Darwin finches in the Galapagos have beak sizes and shapes fitted for different types of food: seeds, insects, cactus flowers and fruits, or even bird blood. Art by John Gould (1804- 1881), Wikimedia Commons.

Hocus crocus, cast a spell with this magical bulb

If your mind is wandering towards spring already, and you are looking to help pollinators, chances are you are thinking what to plant in your greenspace, containers or garden.  You could do worse than to ponder on the value of the crocus.

A crocus with a bumblebee covered in pollen grains. ©Lorne Gill/NatureScot

Not only will it bring a welcome uplifting dash of early spring colour but it could be a lifeline for emerging queen bumblebees. And just as there is variety in the bumblebee world, so there is in the world of crocuses. We speak of it as if it were one variety, but there are many.

An array of colourful crocuses are available to lift the spirits come February and March. They are not far behind the snowdrop when it comes to announcing the impending arrival of a new spring. With their bright and breezy colours ranging from purple, through to a deep golden yellow they certainly do lift the spirits – a great example of the unsung health and wellbeing benefits of nature that we sometimes take for granted.

What do pollinators make of the humble but ever popular drifts of crocus?   Well, quite a lot it seems. Our spring-flowering crocus offer early nectar and pollen sources for bees coming out of hibernation. What’s more it is said that some queen bumblebees have been known to use the flowers as overnight sleeping berths.

That wonderful source of inspiration – the Bumblebee Conservation Trust website – is pushing the value of planting crocuses this October.  As they succinctly put it  “What can you plant for bumblebees in October? Our top picks are crocus bulbs, winter honeysuckle, pussy willow, and mahonia.”

The RHS website is an advocate too. Quick facts they publish include the reassuring news that although crocuses generally prefer sunny and well-drained sites, they are happy on a range of soils. 

Not surprisingly for a flower so vivid and popular there are several historical references to the crocus.

It is said that in 352BC a famous battle at ‘Crocus Field’ was written into ancient Greek history. Both the Romans and the Crusaders have been credited with introducing the bulbs to western Europe. There are references to use of the word crocus in Sanskrit, Greek, Hebrew and Latin so tracing the true roots of the name is shrouded in history. Homer, the author of the Illiad and Odyssey, is said to have lyrically compared a golden crocus to sunrise. A less cheerful association in Greek mythology is the tale of a young man called Crocus, a broken-hearted lover who was turned into a flower, two versions survive, neither ending well for the love-sick Crocus.

You might wish to bear in mind that there are both autumn and spring Crocus species. Colchium is an alternative name for the autumn crocus (and contains a drug called colchicine, which was used to treat gout).  But if you opt for the ever popular spring flowering crocus you will be helping out early emerging pollinators. And remember in that cooler time of the year you do get a chance to look more closely at the insects. 

Great fun for you, a vital lifeline for early emerging pollinators. Now that is a magic recipe.

Is the sward mightier than the pen?

Edinburgh is a city of traditions. Take the Edinburgh International Festival, and the Fringe and Tattoo which followed, all living examples of the capital city’s great love of a good time. Edinburgh Living Landscape is similarly successful in pushing a sound idea that heralds good times.

Visit the website of Edinburgh Living Landscape and you get a sense of better things in store for nature in our capital.  It tells the eager reader that “Edinburgh Living Landscape is a network for nature in our city. We think it is crucial for the future health, happiness and wellbeing of Edinburgh’s people and wildlife.

“Our  programme will demonstrate that investment in the natural environment makes economic sense, as well as increasing biodiversity and creating healthier urban ecosystems. 

“To do this we need to integrate nature into neighbourhoods across the city. Edinburgh Living Landscape will work to benefit local people and wildlife with an aim to make the city one of the most sustainable in Europe by 2050.”

That’s as good as it gets when it comes to statements of intent for nature. What’s more with an impressive list of partners you just sense that this is a project that will deliver, time after time. With bodies including Scottish Wildlife Trust, The City of Edinburgh Council, The Conservation Volunteers, Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh,  Greenspace Trust, The University of Edinburgh, Butterfly Conservation Scotland, and RSPB you know that local people and native wildlife are in good hands.

The drivers behind changing the way we mange public spaces have never been more compelling. From the early 1930s there began a systematic loss of beneficial grasslands for nature, by the time a mere 50 years had come and gone that loss of habitat, and the food sources that went with it, was depressingly mainstream. Urbanisation, development pressures, intensive farming .. and so the list of challenges went on. 

And the damage didn’t stop there.  What was actually left even in urban areas was subject often to harsh management, including routine spraying and chemical treatments. This simply compounded the crisis. Something had to give, and thankfully it was the depressing descent into devastating loss that gave.

Today we are better informed. We know that creating and managing habitats specifically for nature is the way forward. This is particularly so if we want to achieve nature restoration and tackle climate change. It’s therefore great that our capital city is taking significant steps to ensure that on their patch habitat loss is reversed.

The method is a swing away from the old way of doing things towards a mixture of relaxed mowing regimes, sensitive planting and more sympathetic management of greenspaces for nature. Edinburgh has embraced a mixed approach. Take meadow creation and management as one example. There are a variety of meadows to find and enjoy in and around Edinburgh. By far the bulk at wildflower meadows. However, there was a stunning designed or pictorial meadow at Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh and this was a powerful way to get people thinking and talking about meadows. This approach can be, as the excellent Plantlife website explains, a means to an end, as it ‘… crucially, starts warming attitudes – opening minds to other possibilities beyond the mown ‘neat-and-tidy’ approach. You can see the bees and butterflies.”

Informative signage is increasingly important too. Perception has a vital role to play particularly when changing the management regime of public facing amenity grasslands leads to transformation which isn’t often an overnight fix. Where people are used to neat, clipped, mown parkland it often requires a little explaining to extol the virtue of letting the grass grow longer, planting for pollinators and letting nature take its course. 

Whist at their peak meadows speak for themselves, it is the case that when freshly mown, or lying dormant, you have to sometimes work to ‘sell’ what is going on.  Then it helps to explain that the space – viewed by some as superficially scruffy – is actually being managed for nature and that what lies before the curious onlooker is perfectly normal … and beneficial. It will offer a home for nature and not just a forage for food source, it’s a habitat that offers shelter, nesting sites and overwintering opportunities. Generally people get that and are receptive to positive messaging.

So when next you visit Edinburgh and soak up the cultural delights, bear in mind that across the city there are good things happening for nature. Nature restoration is rarely a quick fix, but in a city famed for being more cerebral than most it is arguably culture at its highest.

Aberdeen’s natural progress

Of late Aberdeen City Council’s Environmental Services team has adopted a more natural approach to managing many of the city’s greenspaces. That’s good news for nature, and the people of Aberdeen.  As the team in the north-east are quick to point out, managing urban spaces specifically for nature is an effective conservation strategy to help protect biodiversity, while spending time in nature-rich green spaces helps improve our mental and physical health.

There is a rapid coming to terms with the need to take action across Scotland to manage greenspaces more sustainably. There are two towering drivers. One is to mitigate against the impacts of climate change, the other is to support biodiversity. 

Fernielea Green Space natural wildflowers.

In the biodiversity mix are our pollinators. Our bumble bees, solitary bees, hoverflies, butterflies, beetles and moths are under pressure, with habitat loss, disease, pesticides and climate change on the charge list. The philosophy adopted in Aberdeen, which restores and creates habitat, would work well across the country and take some of the pressure off pollinators. 

Aberdeen’s changes are, by adopting common sense approaches such as reducing grass cutting, planting trees, shrubs, and wildflowers, boosting habitats for many species. What’s more they do so in a way which doesn’t exclude people and supports the urban environment.

That latter point will strike a chord with many to are increasingly looking to good green infrastructure to provide nature based solutions and improve city living.  In Aberdeen the act of planting more trees alone improves the local air quality and reduces rainwater run-off.

The is no doubt that Aberdeen’s goals were hampered by the Coronavirus outbreak. The subsequent lockdowns meant that their Environmental Service was effectively stood down. This placed significant restrictions on much of the work that the service carried out. But in the background it was providing an opportunity to take stock of how the city manages its greenspaces and contemplate changes that could be made. And we know that across the globe the challenges of lockdowns reconnected people with nature.

Steven Shaw who is Aberdeen City’s Environmental Services Manager, was one of those who seized the moment to turn things on their head.

‘When the service resumed,” he says, “it was seen as a perfect opportunity to trial a different way to manage green space, with a focus to do so in a more natural way, to help with climate change mitigation and increase biodiversity benefits, but ensuring also that the Aberdeen public continued to enjoy access to good greenspaces.“The simplest way to manage these open spaces for nature was to reduce grass cutting and encourage nature to bloom.  Many of the areas were, and remain, popular areas for walking, running, cycling and dog walking, and are away from the surfaced path network. To maintain access for these activities, wide paths have been cut though the areas of longer grass.

“Routes for these paths were chosen by following ‘desire lines’ where usage revealed the natural paths people were taking. This was often a link between points of interest or access to any existing surfaced path network. The extent of mown paths will be regularly assessed on a site-by-site basis. If more paths are requested the service will look to include them.”

An example of a mown path through biodiversity friendly grassland

An impressive list of sites across Aberdeen are now managed in a more natural way and benefit from relaxed mowing regimes and new planting.  Sites benefitting from the new approach include 

• Stonehaven Road 
• Riverside Drive
• Garthdee Road 
• Heatheryfold
• Maidencraig
• St Fitticks Park
• Westfield Park
• Raeden Park
• Parkway former Trunk Road Verges
• Culter Bypass
• Fernielea Park
• Kingswells Bypass
• Eric Hendrie Park
• The Woodies, Broomhill Road
• Skene Road Verges
• Riverview Drive

It is an impressive list, and what’s more it is particularly pleasing that the Aberdeen team didn’t just assume they had got it right. They surveyed the sites to see what changes had taken place, and noted the species thriving. That provided cast-iron confirmation that they were making a difference.

Around 80 species of wildflowers and plants were found in the list of sites. Those flowers included northern marsh orchids, buttercups, hawkbits, dandelions, scentless mayweed, ox-eye daisy, meadowsweet, cow parsley, bugle, sorrel, red clover, white clover, and birds-foot trefoil. Inevitably this had a beneficial knock on effect for a host of pollinators ensuring that there was variety and something in flower at different times.

It is important to emphasise that there is not always a ‘one size fits all’ solution to sites. All these areas will therefore receive a site-specific maintenance programme.  This will include a mixture of different regimes, from areas being left alone, to grass being cut and uplifted once a year, through to grass that is cut twice per year.  Of course, for the mixed use agenda to thrive grass paths and access points will need to be regularly cut and maintained.  It’s that willingness and determination to go back and see what has worked and what needs tweaked that will serve Aberdeen well.

There is also a ‘softer’ dividend in the form of partnership working. As Steven noted “The new methods are ideal in developing skills and confidence around managing land for nature and biodiversity.  What’s more they are highly visible and lead to increased interaction and engagement with other like-minded organisations enabling the Aberdeen Council team to strengthen green connections and networks between organisations and partners.”

He goes on to explain that “Changing the management regimes of public greenspaces is a move which is gaining momentum up and down the country. From ‘No Mow May’ to relaxed mowing there is a growing realisation that amenity grassland can work much better for nature with some tweaks.

“With increasing awareness of climate change, there is a need to take action to manage greenspaces more sustainably.

“Aberdeen’s Environmental Services believe that a managing spaces for nature is positive greenspace management and here to stay across the city.  The new natural areas in Aberdeen are evidence that we are moving towards a greener, healthier city, and this has to be good news for Aberdeen’s people and its nature.”

Parks from London, to Newcastle, to Aberdeen are on the front line in the battle to better green our cities. Our greenspaces were a vital resource for communities in the pandemic, and they are a permanent opportunity for our hard pressed wildlife.  That’s why the strides being made in the way Aberdeen manages its greenspaces should be applauded and encouraged.

This Side of Paradise

“My irregular lawn, well shaved by Gatsby’s gardener” observed Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby. Fitzgerald wrote his masterpiece in the 1920s, and for many years after the well-shaved lawn became part and parcel of popular gardens. Now, as they will tell you in Glasgow, that neat and tidy philosophy is wilting fast.

The Jazz Age, Long Island, life of Gatsby is long gone, today more and more of us are looking to go easy on the mowing, let the flowers flourish, tolerate a bit of untidiness.  Often with the specific aim of helping pollinators. Glasgow is one Scottish city that has totally embraced a pollinator friendly approach to greenspace management – they even have their own Pollinator Plan and grasp that pollinators are a key part of Scotland’s biodiversity.

Take a walk around this vibrant city and you will see charming pictorial meadow strips (1m wide) which have sprung up across Scotland’s largest urban community. Created at the front of uncut grass, harbouring a variety of species and aesthetically pleasing heights, they are seeded with cornfield annuals and have been a big hit, the emphasis is on ‘big’ as they total 7,500 square metres over 23 sites. 

And that is just one string to Glasgow’s ever-productive bow in creating green havens.  At Hogganfield Park and Queen’s Park you will find greenspaces that are labelled as Pollinator Parks. It’s a bold sign that Glasgow takes its biodiversity duties seriously and is comfortable mixing park uses and introducing new nature friendly approaches.

There is a clear purpose to the council’s actions and they are adept at calling on the help of expert partners. Anthony McCluskey is a fine example of this method. Well known for his work with bumblebees and butterflies he works with Glasgow City Council to deliver ‘Helping Hands for Butterflies’ at the city’s Ruchill, Elder and Springburn Parks.

Perhaps pride of place in Glasgow’s suite of insect friendly project should go to the Green Connectors project,  Phase 1 of which was funded by the NatureScot  Biodiversity Challenge Fund.  As a result Glasgow City Council has been able to commit £1.5 million from its budget over five years to implement this drive across the rest of the city. Even to the most sceptical onlooker this innovative green infrastructure approach surely shows the level of Council support for pollinators. 

In a mosaic of projects some catch the eye for their uncanny success in drawing people and nature together.  Various Friends of Parks groups offer the council vital support in carrying out wildflower planting and Glasgow has embraced  the initiative that Buglife got underway in the shape of imaginative and much needed B-Lines running through the city. 

RSPB Scotland have been consistently good partners for Glasgow, and they cut and lifted the highly popular existing wildflower meadow behind Kelvingrove Art Gallery in a bid to reduce nutrients and enhance biodiversity. Additional TCV meadow management – a total of 6 days’ work (168 hours) was carried out at four sites – Elder Park, Glasgow Necropolis, Ruchill Park and Springburn Park

Glasgow is enthusiastically embracing the new relaxed mowing, better-managed greenspace philosophy. It can point to 13 large meadow sites across the city managed by a contract farmer and 15 smaller sites managed by The Conservation Trust with help from the Council. This habitat creation is exactly what we crave more of in the environmental sector.

All of these planting efforts and pollinator savvy approaches mark Glasgow out as a city that recognises nature has a problem and needs our help. Even Gatsby’s gardener would surely have approved of a shift that is gradually delivering an urban pollinator paradise.

Walk this way

In an afternoon in July a group met to walk along the Kinross Raingardens Trail. What they were going to see, and celebrate, was a fine example of the power of nature based solutions. Setting off from Kinross’s Park & Ride the group would look at a series of swales and wetlands designed to harness the power of nature to tackle an environmentally challenging issue.

Let’s pause for a moment. You might be asking yourself “What is a raingarden?” Had you asked the question during the walk the likely answer you would have received is that it is a collective term for various water management features, in its simplest form it is a planted area designed to accept rainfall running off adjacent land.

That’s a clear, if brief, way to explain what otherwise could be seen as a range of technical solutions comfortable with phrases such as enhanced extended detention basin, constructed wetland, infiltration basins; infiltration swales; permeable pavements, conveyance and biofiltration swales; hybrid hard/soft engineered permeable surfaces such as ‘grasscrete’. The user-friendly phrase raingardens neatly avoids the need to stretch for the nearest reference book.

Brian D’Arcy has been central to this project for several years now and recognises the dual task in front of him. The challenge at its simplest is how to use nature based solutions to tackle climate change issues such as flash flooding, whilst simultaneously explaining the techniques to a curious general public? Aided by an enthusiastic group of experts and volunteers alike he has done just that in four short, but hectic, years. The results are visually and environmentally impressive.

Nature based solutions of this kind are not a one-off, walk away, job done, fix. To imagine otherwise would be foolhardy. The walk explained that maintenance is required to ensure the effectiveness of the solutions. That’s something that has been grasped not just in Kinross but in smaller projects in outlying villages around Loch Leven such as Kinnesswood and Milnathort too.

Rain garden projects come in all shapes and sizes. 

Some notable projects have been delivered in partnership with local businesses such as the impressive willow swale at the car park edge of ‘Dance Connect’ in Kinross, and the wildflower plantings at ‘Kipper Hire’ in Kinross. 

Hungry diners can view retrofit planted channels and mini-basins in the car park at the highly popular Loch Leven’s Larder, whilst in Bridgend Industrial Estate gravel drains feature as part of a treatment wetland basin.

Shift along to the West Kinross Link Road and you can view an impressive detention wetland and street edge mini-swales (with short mown grass) all regularly viewed given that many people pass on their regular journeys. However, arguably the most visible project is the vastly improved Park and Ride facility in Kinross which offers much more for biodiversity than its predecessor managed. 

You could argue that the projects are at their most appreciated in a community setting, such as the ponds at three housing developments. Meanwhile a retrofit raised bed garden at Portmoak Primary school, and the‘ Natural raingardens’ at the lower end of overspill car parking in Kirkgate Park, catch the eye and give a growing sense that the approach is increasingly visible in the heart of local neighbourhoods.

For the projects to successfully deliver multiple benefits in different locations calls for a wide knowledge base. The key to harnessing that is partnership working. This draws  together those with expertise in delivering technical solutions and those with an environmental insight – such as the Tayside Biodiversity Partnership. 

This team work ensures that the community benefits from truly integrated and ‘natural’ solutions which deliver multifunctional benefits. All the retrofits have been working to reduce flood risks and most of the existing sites have dual function in the shape of water quality protection. However, there is a welcome and huge biodiversity bonus with the creation of wildflower and pollinator rich features in the townscape environment which just happen to visually enhance the areas for local people and visitors to enjoy and, as an aside, contribute directly to targets within the Scottish Pollinator Strategy.

Even something as apparently straightforward as reduced mowing regimes delivers reduced public expenditure on grass cutting, a smaller carbon footprint, and a haven for wildlife. In the wider sense the work here raises the profile of the necessity to embrace climate change mitigation measures now. 

For pollinators the work has certainly  been a real bonus. The projects use native vegetation, sourced from the highly respected Scotia Seeds (a recognised authentic native wildflowers supplier) in Scotland. These plants have lower nutrient requirements (and hence leaching losses) and lower watering requirements than conventional garden plants, which is all music to the ears of the project team. 

Other issues such as habitat fragmentation benefit from the  creation of ‘stepping stones”, which are a key part in producing healthy greenspaces for insects. It isn’t just the increased network of food sources that is good news, it’s the seasonal variety on offer too.

In 2020 the embryonic group had a goal to achieve 20 raingardens in the district, such was the zeal and enthusiasm that it had delivered that by 2021. 

Such startling progress clearly resonated with many.  Supporters include Scottish Government and SEPA, as well as Perth and Kinross Council. And to crown it all Kinross Raingardens won CIRIA’s ‘Community SuDS’category to scoop a prestigious national award. 

That’s quite an accolade. CIRIA is the construction industry research and information association, and within that body Susdrain is a respected community that provides a range of resources for those involved in delivering sustainable drainage systems to help to manage flood risk and water quality. It also makes no bones about the need to simultaneously improve biodiversity and amenity.

The raingardens challenge was designed to tackle issues ranging from regular flash flooding, biodiversity loss, quality of greenspaces, through to diffuse pollution from car parks, industrial premises and roads. The realisation that alongside technical solutions there was a need to navigate a clear path through language and communications was a vital component. 

So, should you take a stroll around Kinross, do look at the impressive raingarden solutions. The local community are rightly proud of the changes made at Portmoak Primary School, Kinross Park & Ride, Loch Leven Boathouse, and Kirkgate Park to name but a few. Each project is testimony to a group that can both ‘talk the talk’ and ‘walk the walk’. 

Images copyright and courtesy of C A G Lloyd

Windswept and interesting

Speak to any National Nature Reserve manager in Scotland and one thing is for sure – they will all tell you that their reserve is, whisper it, actually the best in the country.  Now, I’ve no inclination to take sides, and each and every reserve I’ve visited has been fantastic, but I have to concede that there is something about the tremendous variety at St Cyrus NNR that grabs your attention.

Sure it can be a site of blustery winter storms, and the salty winds promise untold harm to your complexion, but when you have long expanses of beach, rolling sand-dunes and a backdrop of towering inland cliffs you know that you are somewhere special, somewhere to be savoured.

Diversity is the name of the game here. Birds, plants, sea life, scents, sights and sounds jockey for position.  If pollinators are on your wish list then a visit in summer is recommended. The place is simply awash with wildflowers and performs sterling service as a haven for insects. 

Reserve manager Therese Alampo won’t disagree. In fact she will regale you with tales of birds, butterflies, moths, sand dunes, seals and flowers until the sun dips behind you. Selling the virtues of the many paths that criss-cross the reserve comes naturally, as does the insistence that one trip is never enough.  She ought really to be selling tickets … the commission would be incredible.

The pollinator trail is well worth sampling. There are currently eight stopping points on a trail that piggy-backs on existing floral trails.  Subjects covered include the tawny mining bee, unkempt corners, the much maligned ragwort, hoverflies, leaf-cutter bees, and valuing our wasps.

There’s a buzz and a hum at St Cyrus. Pollinators feast on the nectar and pollen banquet.  And the fun starts right at the car park, for within yards of leaving you are likely to come across mining bees making good use of the exposed soil around a fence line. Then it is onto a boardwalk that lifts you over what some might call a scruffy area, but others celebrate as a natural oasis.

Before Covid struck the reserve offered a children’s quiz that added a fun sense of purpose to many school outings around the reserve. As Therese explains the information on offer at the reserve is eagerly soaked up, be it in the shape of quizzes or information panels. “Every day we see people stopping to read the information on the short trail” notes Therese, “sometimes simply capturing an audience that may just be on the way to the beach.  I love people’s reactions to the trail and the fascination, particularly to the wasp panel, ‘Really, wasps are useful? I never knew that!’ It’s lovely to provoke that sense of interest.”

Therese isn’t the only enthusiast for the reserve. Noted local photographer, Pauline Smith, has wowed people for several years now with her stunning macro shots of the insect and flower life on the reserve.  Our blog, and indeed the pollinator information panels at St Cyrus, have been lucky to tap into her amazing skills.

Photographer in residence at St Cyrus National Nature Reserve, Pauline not only takes awesome wildlife photos, but enjoys a deep understanding of the reserve’s nature. When not getting up close to insect life she is a scientific copy-editor and that eye for detail serves her extremely well as a photographer.

Wasps, butterflies, solitary bees, caterpillars and bumblebees have all fallen under Pauline’s near forensic gaze. The images she captures show not just the beauty of nature, but the complexity and detail in the structure of so many of our invertebrates. From camouflage to intricate mouth parts, she is capable of shining a light on the minutest detail. That takes well-honed field craft and a connection with nature. 

Pauline has been enjoying the reserve daily since 2017. She first came to St Cyrus NNR to walk her dog, but was immediately hooked by the huge variety of wildlife supported by the reserve. She hones in on the macro world because she is fascinated by those small details, such as the intricacies of a caterpillar’s foot or the impressive moustache of a male mining bee, that can be revealed by a macro lens. 

Her favourite pollinators are solitary bees, with leafcutters and the gold-tailed melitta being particular favourites. Pauline finds the most challenging thing about macro photography to be getting her subjects to stay still long enough to obtain both aesthetically pleasing bug’s-eye-view photographs and photographs showing enough distinguishing features to allow the species to be identified, which is no mean feat (even with detailed photographs) for solitary bees. Pauline’s commitment to never interfere in the behaviour or habitat of her subjects in pursuit of her envisaged photographs makes her exploration of the macro world an immersive experience, as she enjoys so much time simply observing and learning about her subjects while she waits for natural shots of them going about their ‘buzziness’.

St Cyrus became a National Nature Reserve in 1962. The dune grassland, well-drained and nutrient rich, supports over 300 species of plant. Vetches, speedwell, ragwort … the list of pollinator friendly flowers is expansive. Abandoned churches and fishing stations tell the tale of human association with this site and today it is a highly popular visitor destination.

The pollinator trail is designed to help you get the most out of your visit. And as for the pollinators?  Well, they are certainly well catered for and we hope that trail will help raise awareness of not only this range of insects, but what you can do to help them thrive in Scotland.

Find out more about St Cyrus National Nature Reserve

Find out more about the Pollinator Strategy for Scotland

Images 1 and 2 of St Cyrus Panels, images 3 (composite) and 4 by Pauline Smith.

Taynish NNR is Blooming Marvellous!

By Caroline Anderson

Over the next few months we look forward to regular updates from Caroline Anderson around Taynish National Nature Reserve. Caroline is a keen macro photographer, and her wonderful images and words will paint a vivid picture of one of our most popular reserves, which comes complete with a pollinator trail for you to enjoy.

Easter Monday, and an abundance of wildflowers greet you from the banking as you arrive at the Mill Car Park.   Amongst them Violet, Wood Sorrel, Wood Anemone, Primrose and Bluebell all willing the pollinators to pay them a visit.  

It was such a feeling of relief at the winter being over (technically) and spring having well and truly sprung.  Though not in great numbers, there were insects about.  I saw a few bees, hoverflies and other flying insects making the most of the sunshine.

A quick visit into the boardwalk with fingers crossed and a hopeful hop through the bog, but no damselflies just yet – maybe in the next week or two. 

Down at the picnic area where it is more sheltered, there was a bit more activity, a couple of Peacock butterflies around and the blossom on the cherry trees is just glorious and attracting some attention!   Despite one of the trees being damaged in a winter storm, it has blossomed beautifully. 

The daffs were also getting some insect attention – albeit from a very little insect on one, to a Peacock butterfly on another – but every little bit of pollinator action helps.

In the wood towards the shore the Stitchwort is starting to appear, it’s such a beautiful delicate wee plant.

Further into the woodland you will see Wood Sorrel – with its gorgeous purple and pink veining. 

Finally, a reminder, it’s not easy being green as this wee fly would tell you, so from a planter with some lavender to leaving a bit of the lawn to flourish with buttercups and daisies, you can do your bit to help these beautiful insects do their bit.  

Links : Visit Taynish National Nature Reserve

Nectar network

Good things are certainly happening in Ayrshire for pollinators. An impressive range of partners, with an equally impressive range of sites, are dramatically improving pollinator habitat, whilst introducing new audiences to the fascinating role of these vital insects.

Irvine beach Park Pond Meadow – (c) Lynne Bates

A vibrant combination of willing volunteers, enthusiastic partners and respected specialists bodes well for a winning combination, and this is certainly borne out by the Scottish Wildlife Trust-led Irvine to Girvan ‘Nectar Network’ along the Ayrshire coast.

Calling upon the expertise of environmental agencies, working closely with local councils, and harnessing the support of students and staff at Scotland’s Rural College (SRUC), the Nectar Network is a catalyst in expanding knowledge and skills to create and manage pollinator habitats

Last year volunteer surveyors were trained, kitted out and allocated sites along the coast to systematically monitor the biodiversity of the area. Methods employed included the increasingly popular Flower-Insect Timed (FIT) counts, allied to conventional transect walks, which allow for a better monitoring of the health of pollinators across the landscape. 

It is often said that habitat improvements and creation are the single most effective thing we can do to help pollinators. And there are so many examples in Ayrshire that it takes the breath away. Here’s a flavour of what’s been going on …

• The children at Symington Primary School sowed their own mini meadow with wildflowers and yellow rattle, helped by the enthusiastic South Ayrshire Rangers. 
• The Rotary Club of Prestwick enhanced an unused site next to Prestwick Railway Station, sowing wildflowers to provide food for pollinators and interest for commuters.
• Greenkeepers at The National Centre for Bowling, Ayr removed turf and sowed native wildflower seeds in two large areas within the grounds to encourage pollinators in the area.
• A new wildflower meadow at Little Acorns Forest School, Auchincruive created last year with the help of the children, volunteers and parents has been a colourful success. Providing opportunities for surveying and identification plus outdoor learning and creating a real buzz for pollinators and people.
• Two large new wildflower meadows created on public greenspaces in Irvine, adjacent to Scottish Wildlife Trust Wildlife Reserves, not only improves connectivity for species moving across the landscape but provides visual interest for locals visiting the sites. 
• Eglinton Community Gardens in North Ayrshire called upon the help of 36 employees from a local company to prepare and sow a large new meadow, increasing the abundance of forage and nesting opportunities.
• The new Pond Meadow sown in autumn 2020 at Irvine Beach Park was cut, collected and the green hay used to extend the Dragon Meadow. A total of two hectares of the park is now wildflower meadow habitat which will support a range of wildlife, food for pollinators and provide colour and visual interest for visitors to the park. 
• Over 400 trees were planted at Low Pinmore Farm to create a new flowering hedge to connect existing pollinator areas and provide vital food and nesting areas

By any measure that’s an impressive catalogue of activities. With so many partners and such a wide range of sites, Ayrshire certainly looks set to be an area where pollinators can thrive. However, that’s not all that’s been happening.

One growing area of interest focuses on the potential of roadside verges to help pollinators. 

Local volunteer surveyors were trained for a new partnership with Symington Community Council’s Wildflower Project. A great example of partnership working the project draws together Transport Scotland, Amey (who operate and maintain motorway and trunk road technology infrastructure across Scotland) and South Ayrshire Council in exploring ways to improve verge management for pollinators. 

The method is strikingly simple, yet effective. The grass verge on the outskirts of the village has been left to grow and will only be cut in late summer, in the meantime spring and summer will see weekly pollinator and plant survey undertaken by the volunteers to help to inform the next stage of the project. 

Coming on the back of Plantlife’s national drive to raise awareness of the potential of roadside verges for pollinators this is a fantastic development to see in Scotland.

Another key focus is the connection between Kidney Vetch and the Small Blue, Britain’s smallest butterfly. The Ayrshire Small Blue was given a boost last year, through support from the local Garnock Connections project. Kidney Vetch is the sole larval foodplant of the Small Blue so determining its current status along the Ayrshire coast is crucial. Working alongside Lynne Bates who is the Nectar Network Co-ordinator at Scottish Wildlife Trust was Butterfly Conservation’s Tom Prescott.

In a region famous for its golf courses, the work to protect and extend the range of sites supporting Kidney Vetch cleverly harnessed the knowledge of local greenkeepers and golf course managers. Detailed surveys determined the current status of Kidney Vetch, which also helps identify sites where more beneficial planting can take place.

The results were impressive, with over 40 people taking part in online training workshops, 33 volunteers surveying over a dozen sites, and no fewer than eight golf courses from Irvine to Troon getting involved.

As a result, kidney vetch was recorded at 116 locations, with over 3,500 plants being recorded. All in all, a staggering 55,000 flower or seed heads were counted. A student from SRUC is now analysing the survey forms to map the distribution (and gaps) to help steer future actions.

The Ayrshire coast is proving a hot spot for pollinator friendly activity and through sharing learning and knowledge with key organisations, partners, businesses and individuals, everyone is playing an important role in creating a network for pollinators.

Find out more @ Irvine to Girvan Nectar Network

Many thanks to Lynne Bates, who is the Nectar Network Co-ordinator at Scottish Wildlife Trust, for all her help with this article.

Little Acorns meadow July 2021 – (c) Emily Hamalainen

            Low Pinmore Farm hedge planting – (c) Lynne Bates

Kidney Vetch survey training Gailes Marsh Wildlife Reserve