Increasing floristic diversity in grassland: the effects of management regime and provenance on species introduction

Concerns over recent losses of floristic diversity in British grasslands ha ve led to a new impetus to recreate species-rich pastures. However, such pr ogrammes often require the active introduction of wildflower seed or plants to achieve rapid increases in diversity. Methods need to be developed for the successful establishment of desirable species into existing species-poo r swards and the implications of using different seed provenances need to b e considered. The establishment of five common forb species were compared, each represented by two provenances, sown into a range of swards each recei ving different management regimes. For each species, one provenance was col lected locally and the other was of non-local, commercially-obtained, prove nance. Two years after sowing, the unfertilised sward management with two c uts per year followed by aftermath grazing showed the greatest seedling est ablishment; that with cutting alone showed the least, even less than the ma nagement receiving fertiliser inputs and continuous grazing. Seedling survi vorship was related more to sward management than to fine-scale sward compo sition. Within some species there were significant differences in survival between provenances. The importance of sward management and species provena nce in grassland restoration programmes are discussed. (C) 1998 Elsevier Sc ience Ltd. All rights reserved.