Description of grassland and cultivated land

Introduction

The agricultural area (grassland and cultivated land) is used for livestock farming, arable farming, horticulture and nursery crops. Almost two-thirds of the area of the Netherlands is taken up by fields of grass, arable fields, horticultural holdings, nurseries producing trees and garden plants, and bulb fields.

Area

A large part of the agricultural area is taken up by plots of grassland which, in the low-lying parts of the country are delimited by drainage ditches and canals rather than by hedges or fences and therefore give rise to a very open (i.e. few visual barriers) landscape. This is the most common landscape in the carr peat area. The remainder of the agricultural area consists of open arable land with few trees (mostly in the marine clay areas), and an agricultural area that is visually more broken up by clumps of trees and wooded banks: this so-called half-open agricultural area is typical of the higher-lying sandy soils. In this landscape there is alternation between grassland and arable land.

Use of grassland

The intensive land use and the landscape changes have both had significant impact on nature - in the grassland areas and in the remaining cultivated land. Round about 1950 much of the grassland used was damp and hardly fertilised (so-called semi-natural grassland). This type of grassland is home to many plant species and butterflies. Meadow birds are also very common on this grassland, especially if there is fertilised grassland nearby. The semi-natural grasslands mostly disappeared before 1975.

The use of cultivated land

Rye and oats were very important crops before World War II. But they have now almost vanished and the area under silage maize has increased hugely. Many arable weeds have become rare, and many bird species that nest on fields or on the edges of fields have declined, including the corn bunting and ortolan bunting. The common hamster, which lives in cereal fields, has almost disappeared.

The intensification and upscaling of grassland and cultivated land

In the last hundred years the Dutch agricultural landscape has undergone a transformation as a result of intensification and upscaling. The discovery of artificial fertiliser led to the reclaiming of wasteland and the disappearance of impoverished grassland. Cultivated land and grassland were fertilised more and were more intensively farmed, the stocking rate was greatly increased and different crops were grown. There was also much more weed control, achieved by cleaning seed, applying chemical weedicides and mechanising weed control.

In addition, farm size and field size increased appreciably; this had major repercussions on the landscape. Fields were levelled and their boundaries straightened, areas were drained, and many wooded banks, pollarded willows, shelterbelts, spinneys and unused corners disappeared.

The ongoing intensification stopped some years ago. The stocking rate is now declining on average, which could stimulate the soil fauna, and there has also been a downturn in the use of manure, fertiliser and chemical pesticides. A recent change affecting grassland is the temporary conversion of grassland into arable land, which is unfavourable for meadow birds.