Heath Hands are restoring flower meadows on Hampstead Heath

You can help Heath Hands by donating to our Wildflower Meadow Appeal.

Over the past few years, Heath Hands have been working with the City of London Corporation, which manages the Heath, to transform unloved patches of grassland around Parliament Hill into beautiful wildflower meadows, bursting with life.

Work began with the Sparrow Site, created initially in 2009 with the RSPB. This success led to further projects more recently around Savernake Bridge and the Hive. These areas now have a beautiful array of native wildflowers and are teeming with insects.

Wildflower meadows are one of the most important habitats for our declining pollinators, such as bees and butterflies.

Karin Oleinikova and Heath Hands are working to restore the wildflower meadows on Hampstead Heath (Image: Heath Hands)

Since the 1940s, the UK has lost 97% of its meadows. New meadows created in the Parliament Hill area aim to improve biodiversity on and around the Heath.

Creating and conserving good quality meadows requires a lot of work.

Replacing areas of grass with wildflowers takes more than just a ‘no mow’ approach. The fertile topsoil must be removed to expose less fertile subsoil where wildflowers are more likely to thrive, with less competition from the current coarse grasses and other more dominant plants.

Importantly, we also need to select an appropriate wildflower seed mix, and plants that will benefit a variety of insects.

Now in 2024, we’re planning to expand our efforts, focusing on maintaining the Hive and Sparrow Site meadows, and creating new areas around Parliament Hill.

We’re working with the Heath’s ecologist to monitor diversity improvements and our volunteer wildlife monitors will continue to record the variety of species, particularly butterflies.

Supporting our Wildflower Meadow Appeal will help us to deliver more conservation sessions with our volunteers to carry out practical work to establish new meadows and maintain and restore existing areas.

We will be able to buy suitable wildflower seeds and plug plants, and run more educational visits for local schools, the public, and community groups to learn about plant and insect identification.

• To learn more about our conservation work, including work on wildflower meadows, please visit: heath-hands.org.uk/conservation
• To donate to the Wildflower Meadow Appeal, visit: heathhands.enthuse.com/cf/wildflower-meadow-appeal-2024

Karin Oleinikova is programme manager for Heath Hands.