(^110) an environmenTal hisTory of Wildlife in england
taken time for a rich and complex sward to develop, certain features of these
new pastures immediately encouraged diversity. The fossilized remains of
old plough ridges ensured, within a limited area, considerable variation in
soil water content (Figure 22). Plants like white clover (Trifolium repens)
displayed a marked preference for the ridges while spear thistle (Cirsium
vulgare), ragwort (Senecio jacobaea) and nettle (Urtica dioica) flourished
in the furrows.^93 The number of field ponds increased markedly following
enclosure, providing key habitats for a wide range of plants, fish and
invertebrates;^94 and not only the rabbit, but other small mammals, benefited
from the increase in cover afforded by a landscape of hedged pastures.
It is likely that the decline in the cultivation of cereal crops across large
swathes of the Midlands and west caused reductions in the numbers of some
granivorous birds.^95 On the other hand, more grassland may have increased
the numbers of winter visitors, especially lapwings, plovers, thrushes, and
starlings, although not perhaps those of ground nesting birds, as evidence
suggests that stocking densities in the new fields were high. Local practices
had particular effects, although not necessarily immediately. On the Cheshire
plain, the pastures were fertilized with ‘marl’, calcareous mud dug from
shallow pits. By 1900 it was said that ‘the advance in the manufacture of
artificial manures has caused them to be disused, and now they are choked
with vegetation. The Moorhen builds among their flags and rushes, and
the Sedge Warbler and Reed Bunting sing in the rank herbage and bushes
that clothe their margins’.^96 Agricultural change brought winners and losers,
although we lack the evidence to assess these in much detail.
The environment of ‘high farming’
The high-input, high-output farming systems that began to develop in
the 1830s had their own particular impact on the environment. In the
eighteenth century field drainage, carried out by means of bush drains, had
been largely directed towards arable land. It was now more widely applied,
the new ceramic pipes often being installed in order to improve grassland.
Phillips has calculated that some 4.6 million acres (1.9 million hectares)
must have been drained between c.1840 and 1880, about 35 per cent of the
poorly draining land in England: much of it was pasture.^97 This must have
removed many of the damp flushes which constitute the more interesting
and varied parts of the sward, especially in places where the soil is neutral
and moderately fertile. One pasture field at Cheadle near Staffordshire was
described, immediately before it was drained, as having ‘turf... not of an
inferior description except that it is full of rushes and other aquatic plants’.^98
Improved systems of land drainage also further encouraged the destruction
of further areas of ancient woodland on heavy land in arable districts.^99
Drainage had other effects. Some contemporaries worried about the way in
which more rapid run-off from the land led to increased pressure on rivers.
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