Yorkshire is unique in having four different types of limestone, which are home to many of our rarest and most threatened plants. In fact, almost half of the plants of Conservation Concern listed in the recent State of Yorkshire’s Nature report were associated with limestone/chalk.

One of these types of limestone runs in a thin trip north-south through the centre of Yorkshire. This limestone has different plants to the geology and soils either side; the limestone makes the pH higher, and there is more calcium and magnesium in the soil. The limestone is also free draining, so summers can be dry. These conditions favour certain species; common gromwell (which isn’t all that common), wild liquorice, common restharrow and small scabious are things that are often found in good quality magnesian limestone grassland, but are less common elsewhere.

As magnesian limestone usually forms rolling countryside and the soils are fairly good, the most frequent land use is arable agriculture. In recent centuries, woodland, scrub and grassland on the magnesian limestone have been converted to arable farming, which has become more profitable. As a result, magnesian limestone grassland is now a rare grassland type, and usually sites are small and isolated from other good habitat.

Creating new wildflower-rich grassland at Parson’s Carr

Parson’s Carr is one of our newest nature reserves – although we have been working with Doncaster Council for nearly 15 years, 2024 marked the year it moved into our ownership. At 104ha it is our fourth largest reserve, with lakes, woodland, hedges and some ex-arable land all sitting on magnesian limestone, which runs in a belt roughly along the route of the A1.

As a result, we have therefore earmarked an area to create some new (hopefully) species-rich limestone grassland. Although the area is only about 2.1ha, it is bounded by the rest of the reserve and the complex suite of other nature reserves in the area – including Potteric Carr – which will provide more space for similar work in future.

Creation of new species-rich grassland can be done in many ways. One of the most straightforward ways, which relies on the existence of an existing ‘wild’ site near to the site you are looking to improve, is green hay translocation. Different species occur in different parts of the country, and it is important to try and maintain the unique mix of plants in a specific area, so using the plants from a local site helps to manage this. It also helps to keep a genetic diversity of plants which will help them deal with stresses such as pests, disease, droughts or floods.

What is green hay? What did we do?

To begin with, we cut the creation site and cultivate the ground, using a tractor with discs to break up the surface. By creating bare soil, there is somewhere for the seeds to fall onto, germinate, and hopefully grow into a mature plant.

The next step is to cutting grass from a good quality species-rich grassland, bale it immediately (ie when it is still green) and then move the hay bales to the creation site and spread it out. This is a very effective way of moving seeds from one site to another!

We worked with the Maltby Commons Management Committee, and specifically Sandbeck Estate, so we could cut hay from Maltby Far Common (adjacent to Yorkshire Wildlife Trust’s Maltby Low Common), and used a local agricultural contractor to cut the grass and translocate it to Parson’s Carr.

The area selected is home to lots of zigzag clover, perforate St John’s wort, greater butterfly orchid, grasses and sedges.As well as taking green hay from Maltby Far Common, we moved some smaller amounts of hay from our own Sprotbrough Flash nature reserve with support from the Don Gorge volunteer group entirely by hand - from cutting the hay and loading it into a trailer to spreading it.

This is very time-consuming and only a very small amount of area can be done this way. But there are species found at Sprotbrough Flash that aren’t found on the Far Common - autumn gentian and yellow-wort - which we hope will appear in time on the area we spread by hand.

One of the advantages of having worked on Maltby Commons for over 12 years is that I know where many of the interesting species are found! Spending half an hour collecting a few more specific seeds by hand means that hopefully we will be able to add wild liquorice, common gromwell, greater burnet saxifrage and wild columbine to our meadow display.

Although green hay is a great method of translocating species, sometimes you need to target species that prefer very specific niches directly.

Growing for the future

The next step is to fence the field at Parson’s Carr so it can be grazed, which should take place in autumn. Grazing every year to remove the bulk of the growth is important, as it helps smaller and less competitive species to survive and thrive. Ongoing management year after year is the thing that helps a community of plants reach a balance and therefore have a stable home to live in.

All this work has taken place over just a few days, but it will take several years to see the results. Many of the species are perennial, meaning they grow year after year, but that means it can take 2 or even 5 years before they flower. It can take 10 or more years for a grassland to find a balance; some years appear dominated by one species, but a year or two later they may be less common. We are hopeful that in 2 or 3 years there will be a good display to see, and many of the species we’ve particularly targeted will be visible.

The fencing and green hay work has been funded by the LNER Customer and Community Investment Fund and Countryside Stewardship agri-environment funding.