No Mow May: Tooting Common grass to be left un-mowed so wildflowers can bloom

This spring Wandsworth Council is taking part in the national 'No Mow' campaign run by the charity Plantlife.

Tooting Common and several other parks and green spaces will have no lawnmowers for the month of May so wildflowers can bloom.

Enable Leisure and Culture, which look after the common and other green spaces, will choose selected lawns to allow to grow.

They say this will be subject to local agreement with residents in the area.

On the second bank holiday weekend of May residents will be encouraged to visit Tooting Common and take part in the 'Every Flower Counts' survey.

The survey will allow people to discover a variety of spring plants that are hidden on these sites and Plantlife will provide a spring "nectar score" for each site with the submitted results.

The council's also encouraging people to take part in No Mow May at home.

Local gardeners are urged to leave the lawnmower or strimmer in the shed for a month to see what blossoms and which pollinators visit.

The council says this is only the first in a series of actions that will deliver improvements for pollinators in green spaces.

The actions are to support their 'Wandsworth biodiversity strategy'.

As well as bees, the strategy also has measures to support the lifecycles of other pollinators, including butterflies and moths, hoverflies and some soldierflies.

All of the grasslands that will get involved with No Mow May are:

• Battersea Park

• Falcon Park

• Lower Putney Common Cemetery

• Morden Cemetery

• Tooting Common

• Wandsworth Park

The results from Wandsworth will help produce specific new wildlife gardening advice later this year.

You can find out more about Wandsworth biodiversity strategy here.