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Outdated rules on ‘weeds’ are hurting wildlife

A small white butterfly landing on ragwort © Jon Hawkins Surrey Hills Photography

The past 66 years have seen ragwort demonised in policy and removed in great swathes. It’s time to end the war on wildflowers. Matt Browne, Head of Public Affairs at The Wildlife Trusts, explains more.

When it comes to wildflowers and the law, three striking facts co-exist: 

  1. We have a native wildflower that provides food for over a hundred different insect species - 27 of which feed on it alone. Insects thrive wherever the wildflower springs up, from peacock butterflies to carpenter bees, attracted by the plant’s energy-rich and long-lasting food supply.
  2. We have an insect crisis, having lost more than 50% of our insects since 1970, with reduced food supplies from wildflowers declines being a contributing factor. This crisis has consequences going all the way up the food chain, exacerbating the decline of nature. Pollinators have been hit particularly hard, which poses an existential risk to food production.
  3. We have a law, passed 66 years ago, which leads to this wonderful, wildlife-boosting wildflower being removed if spotted, across vast swathes of the countryside. 

Welcome to the topsy turvy world of common ragwort, and the Weeds Act 1959. Thanks to this archaic piece of legislation, land managers spend huge amounts of time and money every year destroying a biodiversity-boosting wildflower.  

A front view of a cinnabar moth caterpillar - which is black with orange stripes, with wispy long white hairs visible - climbing over the top of ragwort flowers

A cinnabar moth caterpillar on ragwort © Vaughn Matthews

The Act itself is an unlikely survivor of another time, a product of the intensification of English agriculture following World War Two. 

Ragwort and grazing animals had co-existed alongside each other for millennia before this, with grazing animals warned off eating the plant (which is toxic if consumed in large quantities) by its bright yellow colour and strong smell. 

Both the malodorous qualities of ragwort, and its frequent co-existence alongside grazing animals, is testified to by one of its traditional nicknames - ‘mare’s fart’.  

However, when cut and dried within food or fodder from other plants, these natural warning signs can be lost, leading to possible consumption of ragwort by grazing animals.

As part of the post-World War drive to increase farm outputs at all costs, this small risk to production was deemed no longer tolerable. The 1959 Act gave the Secretary of State power to compel any landowner to stop the spread of ragwort (along with four other specified plants). A real ‘sledgehammer-to-crack-a-nut' solution. 

Other parts of the agricultural intensification pursued by mid twentieth century Governments, like the uprooting of hedges and use of pesticides on a colossal scale, have to some extent been renounced, but the war on wildflowers remains with us.  

A hoverfly can be seen perched on ragwort, with four other hoverflies hovering nearby, looking for a perch.

Hoverflies on ragwort © Janet Packham

The 1959 Act was not designed with animal welfare in mind (a percussor debate saw members of the Lords come close to agreeing to the eradication of all rabbits as another threat to farm produce), but the early 2000s saw calls from some welfare advocates for the legislation to be made yet stronger. 

A tabloid panic, largely debunked by subsequent evidence, suggested that a ‘plague’ of ragwort was spreading across the countryside, posing a particular threat to grazing horses. As a result of this pressure, the 1959 Act was amended in 2004 to introduce a specific code of practice for ragwort. Failure to follow the code can be used as evidence in criminal prosecutions under the Act, giving it considerable weight. 

Under the code, enforced by Natural England, when land is grazed by animals or used for the production of animal feed or forage and farmed under an agri-environmental scheme, ragwort should be ‘adequately controlled’. 

With half of all English farmland farmed under an agri-environmental scheme as of 2025 - a far greater proportion than when the code was written in 2004 - this places a lot of pressure on a lot of land managers to remove ragwort as a precaution to avoid possible prosecution.  

And so, in the midst of insect and pollinator declines and a wider nature crisis, one of the key bodies tasked with tackling this crisis also has to enforce rules ripping up a key food source for over one hundred wild species.  

The limited risk that cut ragwort poses to the welfare of grazing animals shouldn’t be overlooked. However, with all the evidence and technology now available to us compared to 1959 (and indeed to 2004), surely we can now find ways to tackle it that don’t have significant knock-on effects for struggling wildlife? 

Since the 1950s the concept of buffer strips on farmland has been developed as an effective method to stop pollution spreading. 

Could the code of practice be changed to require ragwort only to be controlled in buffer strips directly adjoining land where fodder is known to be grown for grazing animals? Ragwort could then be safely left to grow outside of the buffer strips.  

A small skipper butterfly - with bright orange-brown wings held with forewings angled above hind wings - perched on a ragwort flower. Its proboscis can be seen as it feeds on a flower

Small skipper butterfly feeding on ragwort © Ross Hoddinott / 2020VISION

The latest evidence shows that ragwort is unable to propagate much beyond 14 metres (with the vast majority of propagation taking place within 5m of an existing plant), so buffer strips need not be very large. This tweak would, at a stroke, significantly reduce the amount of land where ragwort has to be controlled, without posing any extra risk to livestock.  

Developments in technology, especially pattern-matching AI tools, could add an additional layer of protection for grazing animals, allowing for the speedy screening and removal of any cut ragwort that makes it into fodder or feed. 

Finally new guidance on pasture management, drawing on the latest evidence, could prevent ragwort making it into fodder in the first place.  

It is important to stress that these changes would not prevent farmers and land managers from still removing ragwort from their land if they wish to. The tweaks would however remove the compulsion to do across so much land, allowing greater freedom of choice on ragwort control.  

The Government also has a tailor-made opportunity to make these simple but impactful changes to ragwort rules. 

Defra’s review of the Environmental Improvement Plan (EIP) is ongoing, aimed at producing an updated plan later this year that will present, refine and align policies across Government to better achieve nature recovery targets. Amending the rules on ragwort is a strong contender for inclusion in EIP policies. 

This would be a simply regulatory change, which would make a meaningful contribution to nature recovery goals, without requiring additional spend from a stretched Defra budget. Changes to the code of practice and new guidance could even be achieved without legislation, although for a comprehensive updating of the rules a full review of the Weeds Act 1959 would be needed.  

These changes would tap into the Government’s growth agenda, taking the burden of ragwort control off the backs of thousands of farmers and land managers, freeing up time, money and labour for more productive investment. 

Similarly, the changes would boost regulator efficiency, allowing Natural England to redeploy scarce resources towards its core nature recovery mission and not towards enforcement work that runs directly counter to it. 

66 years on from the adoption of ragwort rules, a refresh is needed. The evidence of the environmental harm caused by the rules is clear, less harmful and welfare-effective alternatives are available and the perfect opportunity for a change is on the policy horizon. It’s time to end the war on wildflowers.  

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