Seeking aliens and weeding a bog

Kate Pritchard and Louisa Hall from the Botanic Garden have been contributing to a programme to manage an invasive non-native carnivorous plant. The most effective management method is removing plants by hand to reduce the overall population and to minimise seeding opportunity.

Since the 1980s Sarracenia purpurea has successfully adapted to its adopted ecosystem, proliferating with the potential to displace less competitive native plant species with detrimental effects on ecosystem structure and function.

This management programme is a multi-agency partnership with collaboration between Natural England, The Forestry Commission, Dorset Wildlife Trust, Bournemouth University, Loughborough University and The Carnivorous Plant Society. Started in 2017, the project will require several years of sustained effort to manage existing populations of Sarracenia purpurea for the conservation and protection of native biodiversity at this SSSI site.

Previous control studies in other UK sites have shown a 25% cover of Sarracenia purpurea reduces sphagnum moss cover, and at 50% cover there is a marked decrease in biological diversity.