Now that spring has arrived and the first signs of wildflowers appear across many of our nature reserves and green spaces, details have been provided for this years Urban Meadows season.
In response to the Climate Emergency, and to help make our green spaces more wildlife friendly, TVBC will be relaxing the current grass cutting schedules across a number of our sites between May and September. This will create urban meadows, which will provide a vital haven and wildlife corridor for insects including butterflies which have seen a long term decline, with 2024 being the worst year on record for butterflies (from data from UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme, Butterfly Conservation).
The council have been increasing the amount of urban meadow we create each year since we began in 2021. This year, we’ll be letting a total of over 42 hectares in Andover, Romsey and Valley Park grow wilder – that’s more than 82 football fields of grass that will be left unmown until September, when it will be cut and collected.
For more information on Urban Meadows or to make suggestions for new areas to be included for 2026 please email
nomowinfo@testvalley.gov.uk