Vampires in the meadow
The whisper of a breeze ripples across long grasses and gold-centred oxeye daisies. Marbled-white butterflies loop over the meadow, through air thick with bees and hoverflies gorging on nectar-rich scabious. A kestrel flaps languidly along the hedge to take refuge from the midday heat in an oak tree.
Among the nodding grasses, I can see elegant spikes of chrome-yellow flowers, with petals emerging from pale-green pouches that deflate satisfyingly between finger and thumb. This is yellow rattle and, despite those attractive flowers, it is hiding a sinister secret.
On the surface, chalk grassland like this one at Saltbox Hill, near Bromley in Kent, epitomises natural harmony. But dig below that surface and it’s
