The potential for herbicide use in the conservation of Britain's arable flora.

Abstract

The use of herbicides in arable farming since the 1940s is thought to have been one of the major reasons for the disappearance of many species of arable plant from Europe in recent years. The use of broad-spectrum herbicides should therefore be discouraged where species-rich plant communities and rare species still occur. Some selective graminicides however have a negligible toxicity to non-target species, and may be valuable where there are large quantities of grass weeds.