No Mow May 2025 🌼

Hello everyone! It’s that time of year again, time to get involved in a super easy yet impactful campaign to help nature in your very own garden. If you’ve got a garden and your fingers are itching to get out the mower, sit down and read this first……

The sound of people mowing is often said to be a sign of summer arriving. Which when you think about it, is quite odd. Instead of the sound of the hum of insects, birds calling and nature blossoming all around from the spring plant growth, we chose to make the mechanical sound of cutting it all down our stimulus for the change of seasons. And for what reason do we mow in the first place? While there are some benefits to mowing in certain areas, the standard societal desire for a neat and managed lawn all year round generally stems from aesthetic ideals. Manicured lawns are highly valued and seen as traditional in our culture, but in terms of wildlife they could be doing a lot more. We are told that seeing flowers in the lawn means they are weeds. How crazy is that! When I see a lawn or village green or field full of dandelions, I personally don’t think ‘ooh, what a mess’, but ‘wow, look at all the colour, like tiny suns, how pretty’. Weeds are just other plants, the ones we have been told are undesirable. At a time when our pollinators, garden wildlife and so many other species are declining, creating habitats for them to thrive in is a necessity. And the wealth of land used as gardens serves as an important ecosystem in itself. All of these benefits are why Plantlife launched its No Mow May annual initiative. To sign up and access useful resources, please visit their website to learn more. Had a look? OK great, let’s get growing!

Firstly, you need to decide how long you are happy to leave the mower in the shed for. While it is all well and good letting your lawn grow during May, if you’re just going to mow it all back down again on the 1st of June, when many species will have already moved in, the positive impacts will be limiting at best. The RSPB provides information on different mowing cycles, but generally if you can wait until later in the summer, the species that grow in your lawn can be used during the intense spring and early summer breeding season period as important food sources and habitats. This way you can enjoy your time outside in the garden, making the most of the season, surrounded by beautiful flowers and visiting wildlife. Does anyone really prefer to see short stalks of grass when they could enjoy an abundance of colour and life?

Here are some of the little pockets of joy growing in my garden right now…

Alternatively, it might work better for you to let one section of your lawn grow wild. You could put aside one area of the garden to be free of mowing, or you could mow a path between the wild areas and keep that part neat and accessible. There are many examples of this working and looking really beautiful too, plus you don’t get tickled on your way to the washing line.

Now then, I see you Recovering People Pleasers. I hear that little voice that says ‘Everyone will judge me for not looking after my garden? What will they think?’. Well, there is no need to make them speculate. You can download an official No Mow May sign, or you could make your own, and put it out on your front lawn to show people why you are leaving it wild. Some councils have started doing this to show the public the areas of land that are being left for nature, and there’s no reason why other councils, businesses, land owners and gardeners can’t do the same. Also, when they see what beautiful life you have encouraged, they are going to wish they hadn’t spent their Sunday mowing too.

So what are you waiting for, get ready to do…………………….. nothing! Leave the mower for a few months, maybe put up a cute sign to encourage others to do the same and look out for things growing in your garden that you might not have seen. An easy way to care for nature in your garden and contribute to wider action to prevent biodiversity loss in your local area. Perfection 🌷🌼🌻🌺🌸🪷🪻🌿🍀🦋🐛🐝🐞