Five years ago I was concerned about the spread of ragwort in Margravine Cemetery: Yellow Menace. Now the facts have changed and I have changed my mind.
The cemetery may seem to be a bit of a wilderness but that’s far from the case. A team of council gardeners care for its sixteen acres. They do the broad brush stuff and the Friends of Margravine Cemetery pitch in to help, watering and weeding. Until Bertie and I started walking around I had never noticed the incremental changes as trees are pruned or fall over, new trees are planted, new headstones are erected among other interventions.
Ragwort was a menace at Barmeath. In silage or hay it killed cattle. Now I understand there is no chance of this happening in the cemetery. Nevertheless if it would not be ideal if the cemetery was over-run. The gardeners have devised an elegant solution: mowing strips of the cemetery. This policy has another benefit. Since the pandemic, footfall has been a lot higher and paths have been created through the grass. They get muddy when it’s wet. Now there are new mown paths to allow the old ones to recover. The result is a more attractive landscape and less ragwort than five years ago but enough to feed pollinators some of which totally rely on ragwort for its nectar.
In other local news electric scooters have gathered under Hammersmith flyover and I saw a picture of RMS Titanic on Fulham Palace Road.
The truck contains flowers from Holland; artwork is by Paul Kerrebijn.