Despite the rain in August we found a small weather window of four dry days to make hay. Thanks to Anthony Spencer for making the hay and Richard Spencer for helping to load it. We went for round bales this year as we are storing them outside under tarpaulin and they shed water better than square bales. We were slightly down on the yield of hay compared to last year but that is expected as we are not putting any nutrients into the soil in preparation for sowing the wildflower seed mix in the Autumn.

We also had a "Moth Night" on the meadow shortly after the hay cut. A group of moth recorders came to the meadow with their moth traps (big lights) and managed to record 60 different moth species. One of which, the White Point was extremely rare in the UK back in the 70's but is now common in Warwickshire after it is slowly moving north as temperatures increase over Europe. The moth recorders put this movement down to climate change. As we improve the species richness of the meadow, it will be interesting to see if there is any correlation with changes in the moth community.