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Inspired by the idea of doing something positive for their local environment, Yvette Verner and her husband Mike bought a small field close to their home in the south of England. With the bountiful assistance of nature they created a flower meadow which attracts a rich variety of wildlife, including badgers, deer and a multitude of birds and butterflies. In We Made a Wildflower Meadow Yvette tells the story of their meadow: how they designed the layout, selected and planted wild flowers, trees and hedges and spent many absorbing hours wildlife-watching. Meadows such as theirs support large populations of plants, insects, birds and other animals, and are extremely important in maintaining the ecological diversity of our countryside. Many meadow species that farmers and gardeners consider to be weeds are host to other forms of wildlife: the modest oxeye daisy alone supports over twenty species of insect!
Yvette Verner and her husband have loved and cared for half an acre of meadow in East Sussex for over ten years. She is donating half of the royalties from this book to Plantlife International, the UK's leading charity dedicated to the conservation of wild plants in their natural habitats.
"A guidebook rolled up into a love letter [...] Filled with the rhythms of the meadow and the creatures and plants that find a home there."
– Jane Powers, award-winning author of The Living Garden
"This book, full of practical conservation advice, opens the door to the mighty adventure of creating a meadow. It's about being playful, hopeful, and sharing and celebrating the extraordinary things which can happen."
– Eden Project, The National Wildflower Centre
"In places, the biodiversity of our countryside is at an all-time low. This is a wonderful book that shows how each and every one of us can change all that, if only we care enough. Yvette and Mike did just that. They cared enough to spend their hard-earned wages, not on re-decorating the house or a new car, but on buying a tiny piece of land and putting it back into working order as a living, breathing meadow, giving them and their lucky neighbours an ever-changing panoply of nature, season by season [...] It is an inspiring story of our times, but it is much more than that for it is a vade mecum of how it was done and how you – yes you, the reader – can do it for yourself."
– David Bellamy
