The first Saturday in July is National Meadows Day.

It's an opportunity to discover more about meadows and why they are so important to our wildlife, so here is Mike Dilger from Plantlife's Ryewater Farm Nature Reserve to explain why meadows matter.

It really is frightening to think that 97% of British wildflower meadows have been eradicated since 1945.  This has terrible consequences for our bees and butterflies.  Nearly 1,400 species of insects rely on meadow plants to survive. 

There are of course things we can do about this decline.

First off, there's a petition which we can all support 

Save Our Butterflies, Bees and Wildflowers
By Protecting British Meadows!

We can all visit Plantlife's beautiful website and see what we can do to help.  There's lots we can all do, even from home!

And we can also grow our own wildlife meadows at home in our gardens, as Joel Ashton explains.