About Plantlife - The Wild-Plant Conservation Charity

Plantlife is Britain's only national membership charity dedicated to conserving all forms of wild plants in their natural habitat. Plantlife acts directly to stop common wild plants becoming rare in the wild, to rescue wild plants on the brink of extinction, and to protect sites of exceptional botanical importance.

The charity carries out practical conservation work, influences policy and legislation and collaborates widely to promote wild plant conservation.

Wild plants are under severe pressure. Vast tracts of Britain's most cherished wild-plant habitats have been destroyed over the last 50 years: 98 per cent of wild-flower meadows, 75 per cent of open heaths, 96 per cent of open peat bogs and 190,000 miles of hedgerows.

The pressures facing wild plants include threats from intensive agriculture, urbanisation and road building, peat extraction, pollution, water abstraction and the use of non-native varieties of British plants in landscaping and restoration.

The government lists 162 'priority' species of plants threatened with extinction or severe decline. Recent country flora surveys indicate that we are losing on average one wild flower species in each county every year, with a higher extinction rate for mosses and lichens. At a parish level the extinction rate is thought to be higher still.

Plantlife's goal is for: A world in which the riches of our wild plant inheritance are not diminished by human activity or indifference but are recognised, cherished and enhanced. Everyone is encouraged to become a Plantlife member, and share the unique opportunity to become better informed about wild plants and actively involved in their conservation.

Our history

• 1989

  Plantlife was formed by six leading botanists who imagined an organisation that would be "an RSPB for plants"

• 1990

  Plantlife bought two beautiful meadows after the launch - Winks Meadow in Suffolk and Long Herdon and Grange Meadows in Buckinghamshire - with support from Timotei and Plantlife members. Winks Meadow, bought as an emergency operation, is laced in colour from cowslips, pepper-saxifrage and sulphur clover

• 1991

  Plantlife's Death Knell for Bluebells report looks at the effect of global warming on our native plants. The report informed lobbying groups and pressed the government into action, as results showed that most wild plant habitats have vanished because of urban development and farming. Threatened species include the Snowdon lily, bluebell and Jacob's-ladder

• 1992

  Plantlife gave recommendations for legislative and policy changes to help save raised bogs through the Peatland Commission of Inquiry. Lowland raised bogs are under a huge threat from peat extraction for horticultural use. Politicians, civil servants and members of the peat industry could not ignore the facts in the report

• 1993

  Biodiversity Challenge- an agenda for the UK was published in collaboration with a number of leading conservation organisations. Its aim was to set targets for nature conservation not covered in the Government's "Biodiversity Action Plan" produced after the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. Plantlife set targets for over 500 species and 16 habitats

• 1994

  Plantlife's Back from the Brink programme ensures that critically endangered species are cared for through appropriate management. In 1994, Plantlife protected 15 species, including red-tipped cudweed, starfruit and the adder's-tongue spearwort

• 1995

  Plantlife came together with the French environment ministry for the first pan-European conference on the conservation of wild plants, which included delegates from 32 countries. The aim was to see how countries could work together to conserve Europe's wild plant diversity

• 1996

  Thanks to the kind response from Plantlife members and the public, Plantlife was able to purchase Winskill Stones. This beautiful area of limestone in the Yorkshire Dales, a botanically rich wild plant habitat, was threatened by quarrying for garden rockeries

• 1997

  Plantlife joined up with the UK's other botanical societies and other voluntary organisations through Plantlife Link, to produce a strategy for safeguarding Britain's wild plants

• 1998

  Plantlife welcomed its 10,000th member, Iris Inglis, who was awarded a historic flower print to celebrate

• 1999

  Plantlife was very proud when HRH The Prince of Wales decided to become our Patron. With his high profile and views on protecting Britain's environmental heritage, we could not have asked for better support

• 2000

  Plantlife launched the Cowslip Count and Common Plant Survey which enabled members of the public to take part in Plantlife's conservation work across Britain. This will provide Plantlife with valuable data on the status of cowslips and other common plants

• 2001

  Plantlife members and the general public have contributed £45,000 towards the total cost of £200,000 in support of our Back from the Brink species recovery programme, working to save over 99 endangered wild plant species, including the Deptford Pink.