Many meadows were communally managed, with different members of the community being entitled to take hay from a single strip of the meadow. Due to the natural productivity of these meadows, once the hay was cut, the grass would continue to grow, so ‘aftermath grazing’ could also provide a good source of food for stock in the lead up to winter.
Once the hay was cut, the grazing rights were opened up for all. There were two reasons for this. Firstly grazing cannot easily be managed along small strips and secondly, fencing off small strips across a floodplain would not have been sensible on a floodplain, as it would increase the impacts of flooding. This pattern of management is referred to as the Lammas system, because grazing animals would not be allowed on the meadows until after Lammas Day (now the 1st August).
This pattern of management and communal grazing had a number of knock-on impacts. The wildflower diversity was increased, as different strips would have been cut at slightly different times throughout the summer, allowing different species to set seed in different strips and in different years. Additionally, because it was not possible to sell these sites for development or sand and gravel quarrying due to the complicated land ownership and grazing arrangements, some meadows were protected from damage.
These meadows have typically been managed in this traditional way (often by several generations of the same family) for hundreds of years. Stone or wooden markers are used to indicate hay-strip ownership, and communal grazing is still in operation on many sites.
Some meadows are still managed in this way with a Meadows Master in charge of when hay cutting can occur: in some cases the Master is also in charge of auctioning off the hay to local graziers and landowners.
This historical dependency means that these meadows are completely embedded within our culture. Many of their plant species have a range of colloquial names and the myths and folklore surrounding them have developed over centuries.
