Two holders of the Victoria Cross are buried in Margravine Cemetery, see Local Hero and Another Local Hero. There are other war memorials including a column for staff at J Lyons killed in The Great War and a curved wall naming those those killed on the Home Front in WW II. The Lyons memorial was moved here in 2002 when the Lyons building in Greenford was pulled down.
The Friends of Margravine Cemetery take pride in these memorials and also the flora and fauna that flourish here. There is a monthly bird count, new trees are planted and mowing optimised to encourage wildlife.
Now, using all your mental agility, keep that ball in the air while casting your mind back to the rural Ireland of my childhood. The Garda sergeant would pay an annual visit to ensure that no laws were being broken. Small farmers with not enough pasture used to let their cattle out on the road to graze along the verges. This illegal practice was known as grazing the long acre. It was illegal to have noxious weeds in your fields. The worst offender was ragwort and it was popping up all over the place at Barmeath; seeds blew in from neighbouring farms to supplement our home-grown supply. Anyway, after a few years I more or less wiped it out. Conveniently it flowers in the summer holidays and it’s easiest to pull up when it is in bloom but it only flowers in its second year, so you don’t see the results of your work until year three.
A small digression. Whatever time of day the sergeant called, liquid refreshment was offered. On one occassion there was a bottle of champagne open. The sergeant demurred saying that he didn’t drink those lowering mineral waters. It became a catch-phrase to refer to champagne as a lowering mineral water after that episode. The sergeant, incidentally, only drank whiskey as did the parish priest.
Now back to Margravine Cemetery which is over-run with ragwort and in a few years will become a yellow sea of this poisonous plant. Here is the legal position in the UK.
The Weeds Act 1959 specifies five injurious weeds: common ragwort, spear thistle, creeping or field thistle, broad-leaved dock and curled dock. It requires landowners to ‘take such action as may be necessary to prevent the weeds from spreading’. Although this does not mean it is illegal to have ragwort (Senecio jacobaea) growing on their land, landowners would be advised to control it where it poses a risk of spreading onto other properties, especially onto land grazed by horses and cattle.
The Code of Practice appended to the Ragwort Control Act 2003 is still available and gives more guidance to land managers on how to prevent the spread of ragwort.
I bet you didn’t know that. I have written to the Friends offering to assist in its eradication and await their response.
I think I ought to write an odd ode to ragwort; since a considerable amount of time is spent with other National Trust volunteers uprooting the stuff from properties, viz. fields, Strangford Lough islands etc.
The Trust, to be fair, takes its responsibility seriously when its comes to “invasive species”.
As you say, Christopher, most regwort, with a few stubborn exceptions, can be uprooted easily with a firm and determined hand.
I will keep you posted on developments in the Margravine Cemetery, ragwort dept.
I think you should write an Ode to Ragwort, perhaps taking inspiration from Keats, otherwise Boris’s ode to the Turkish President. As ragwort is also known as Stinking Billy there is the opportunity to write something thoroughly offensive – but very funny.
We have come to dislike Valerian, which looks attractive but whose roots do great damage to the walls from which they like to grow. What worries me is that many of the villagers don’t seem to realise this and our’s is notable for its masonry. And we are about to find out how expensive they are to rebuild. I intend to produce a little pamphlet, for distribution, in the hope this will help preserve a feature that is so often taken for granted.
You could say the same of Buddleia which looks inoffensive – even decorative if you want a low, sorry zero, maintenance plant. If you’d like to disseminate your pamphlet on Valerian I’m sure it will be well received here.
Your mention of one of the ragwort’s alternative names, Stinking Billy, prompts me to mention some of it’s other excellent and evocative local names: ‘Stinking Willie, Stammerwort, Devildrums, Staggerwort and ‘Mare’s fart’…!
One source indicates that in some parts of Scotland it is usually referred to as Stinking Willie, partly on account of its unpleasant smell, but more for the fact that it sprang up everywhere that William, Duke of Cumberland went after the Battle of Culloden in 1746.
I note that Ragwort can be called Stinking Billy or James’ Weed, depending which side you fought on at the Battle of the Boyne. Here is a pretty exhaustive list of other names, copied from plant lives.com
Senecio elegans
[Synonyms : Senecio jacobaea, Senecio pseudo-elegans]
RAGWORT is an annual to perennial. Native to South Africa it has daisy-like golden yellow flowers.
It is also known as Agreen, Beaweed, Bennel, Benweed, Bindweed, Boliaum, Buadhghallan (Irish Gaelic), Bouin, Bowen, Bowlocks, Bundweed, Cankerweed, Cankerwort, Cheedle- dock, Common ragwort, Cradle dock, Crowfoot, Creulys Iago (Welsh), Curly doddies, Devildums, Dog stalk, Dog standard, Dog standers, Ellshinders, Entaillies (Channel Islander-Jersey Norman-French), Erba chitarra (Italian), European ragwort, Fairies’ horse, Fellon-weed, Felon weed, Fireweed, Fizz-gigg, Flea-nit, Flea-nut, Flydod, Giacobea (Italian), Gipsy, Groundsel, Grundswathe, Grunsel, Herbe de St. Jacques (French), Horseweed, Jacobea (English, Italian), Jacobée (French), Jacoby, Jacoby fleawort, Jakob’s Greiskraut (German), Jakobskraut (German), Jakobskreuzkraut (German), James’ weed, James’ wort, Keddle, Kedlock, Keedle-dock, Kettle dock, Kreuzkraut (German), Life seed, Mare-fart, Mèque (Channel Islander-Guernsey), Muggert, Purple groundsel, Ragged Jack, Ragged robin, Ragweed, Redpurple ragwort, St. James’ weed, St. James’ wort, Saracen’s compass, Saracen’s consound, Scattledock, Scrape-clean, Seed-of-life, Seggrums, Seggy, Senecione di San Giacopo (Italian), Séneçon jacobé (French), Sleepy dose, Staggerweed, Staggerwort, Stammerwort, Stånds (Swedish), Starwort, Staverwort, Stinking Alexanders, Stinking Alisander, Stinking Billy, Stinking Davies, Stinking nanny, Stinking weed, Stinking Willie, Summer farewell, Tansy, Tansy butterweed, Tansy ragwort, Weebo, Wild cineraria, Yackyar, Yallers, Yarkrod, Yellow boy, Yellow daisy, Yellow top, Yellow weed, and Zuzón (Spanish).