Major road embankments are a refuge for more than 800 species of flora. We should care for them with that in mind
In a ditch by a burger van on the A142 near Ely, Cambridgeshire, lives one of our rarest plants. It is the last natural home of fen ragwort, which shows its yellow flowers each summer despite being assailed by discarded coffee cups and the occasional burning car.
It’s the rarest of many plants for which roadside verges have become a last refuge. The fact that rubbish-strewn verges are home to more than half Britain’s flora – 809 species, according to the charity, Plantlife – is a stark sign of how we have trashed our environment, destroying 97% of wildflower meadows since the 1930s.
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Source: Guardian Climate Change