Sun 31 Jan 2021 07.30 EST
When Barcelona’s inhabitants emerged from a six-week lockdown at the end of April last year, they found that while the city had lain dormant, nature had been busy transforming the streets and parks into a bucolic wilderness.
“The parks were shut, so there was no pressure on them from humans or dogs and no gardening was carried out,” says Margarita Parés, who heads the city’s biodiversity programme.
“It was spring and it rained a lot more than usual. The result was an explosion in plant growth, so there were more insects and more food for birds. And there were many more butterflies, as they are a species that reacts very quickly to changes in the environment.”