The charity, Plantlife exists to encourage us all to help create a plant rich world. Plants make up more than 80% of the Earth’s biomass and their capacity to store carbon can help stabilise our warming world.
Over the last few years, scientific research has thrown a light on the hidden world of fungi and the intimate lives they share with plants. Fungi are a life-support system providing vital nutrients and a subterranean network by which plants communicate. Commonly known as the ‘wood wide web’ this subterranean social network is nearly 500 million years old and mind-boggling. Like the stuff of science fiction, beneath every forest and wood, there is a complex underground web of roots, fungi and bacteria helping to connect trees and plants to one another.
Another piece in the puzzle is that plants need pollinators and pollinators need plants. However both are in sharp decline yet without them, people like us will be in deep trouble.
So, to encourage us to nurture the world around us, Plantlife runs an annual campaign called No Mow May and encourages people to join in their nationwide Every Flower Counts survey.
FAQs can be found here.
You’ll save a lot of fuel in the process and can calculate your output (or savings) here.
And, finally, a short word on climate change. In 2020, a study from Princeton (USA) shows that although manicured lawns look nice to some, they can actually contribute to climate change with the main culprits identified as lawn mowers, gas powered leaf blowers and synthetic fertilizer.
Taking all this into account, surely now’s the time to join No Mow May?
