Derby Road Station Wildflower Patch Renewed for 2022

Volunteers take a break after clearing the wildflower patch at Derby Road station
Volunteers take a break after clearing the strimmed wildlfower patch at Derby Road station

In late September 2020 a group of Station Adopters at Derby Road, Ipswich Friends of the Earth and Ipswich Wildlife Rangers got together to create a wildflower patch in a disused area at the station entrance. The group cleared the plot and sowed it will several different types of wildflower seeds. The path bloomed in Spring 2021 providing a carpet of colour through the summer.

With Summer at an end the patch has died off. The area was strimmed late this September by Railscape who take care of station vegetation. The group reconvened to shake to the clippings to allow the seeds to drop to start the process all over again for 2022. They then gather the clippings and took them to the on-site compost bin which they built from old pallets donated by a local business.

The process provides for a renewable wildflower meadow, a continuing source of food for insects and bees, fosters pollination, generates compost and ensures additional CO2 is not produced as the clippings do not have to be transported off-site.