Dungeness before 1960: the landscape and the people (ENRR571)

Stinking Hawks-beard Crepis foetida declined at Dungeness during the 1900s, to apparent extinction in 1981. Attempts to re-establish the plant during the 1990s at some of its previous sites met with limited success, possibly because of changes at Dungeness relating to the changing human population and its activities since the second world war. This survey was set up to identify any such changes using 1960 as a cut-off point. At the same time, the area of survey was broadened beyond specific sites where the plant had been recorded to include other areas of human occupation and activity, eg the Denge Marsh Road. Some 26 individuals and couples with knowledge of the Dungeness scene before the 1960s kindly completed an interview based on a detailed questionnaire designed to address the above points.