Creating colorful patches of wild flowers is pretty easy and we share a few tips and pics below.
We are offering wildflower seeds at half price (while supplies last) and prepping and planting services at 5% off to anyone in our service area (Greater Bridgeport out to Westport/Weston & Greater New Haven). We want to encourage a splash of color and pollinator progress!
Just fill in the form here to order seeds and or planting services and we will follow up. Order Wildflower Seeds 1/2 Price
Native wildflower patches are great to help pollinators and beautify.
We have 3 types of wild flower seed mix:
1. All Native - mostly perennials: A premium blend of all Northeast Natives including three annuals for first-year color, plus 15 perennials and biennials for continuous bloom. New England Aster, Butterfly Weed, and Lupine are among the native favorites included.
2. Mostly Native - half perennials and half annuals: 27 varieties of wildflowers. 17 annuals for first-year color, plus 10 perennials and 15 biennials to increase over the years. This mix provides great annual color right from the beginning.
3. Partial-Shade Mix: Colorful varied mix of annual and perennial wildflowers. They bloom from Summer to Fall and need about 4 hours of sunlight per day.
At 50% off, it ranges from $3 to $6 per oz. (2 ounces covers 100 square feet 10x10) or $25 to $45 per pound (1 pound covers 1,000 sq ft or 33 x 33).
Spring is the favorite time to plant annual wildflowers and some perennials, though you can plant all year as long as you can tend to moisture in the early days.
Planting is easy if you have bare soil: You sprinkle seed at a rate of .2 oz per hundred square feet , pressing the seed in on top of the soil by tamping or just walking on it, top dressing with a very thin layer compost & straw (wildflower seeds need light to germinate), and keeping patches moist for 1-4 weeks or at least until the plants are 5 or 6 inches tall.
Preparation is key. Some people remove the top layer of grass manually with a grubbing hoe or automatically with a sod cutter. The peeled off grass is then hauled away or composted on site. Then we may amend the soil. I don't like that because you lose top soil and it is a lot of work. Some people mow short and then put down cardboard (brown cardboard only, black ink only, no tape), compost (thin layer to decompose cardboard, half inch or an inch) and double ground mulch (thin layer of half inch or so) to kill off the grass in an area and wait 2 or 3 months or more, and then seed it later. If the target area is small and its a lawn, then it is important to eliminate grass because grass can outcompete wildflowers over the years.
If its a small patch we often scalp the grass first by cutting it really short, sometimes spraying an organic weed killer on it, then we hoe and flip turf upside down to subdue the grass and expose plant free soil, then we sprinkle seed, walk on it and top dress it as described above. Then keeping it moist for germination and getting started is helpful. We can prepare and plant small splashes of color quickly and easily.
Because some native perennials need cold stratification and don't flower until year two or three, we mix in mostly native as listed above which has more annuals for faster flower blooming, with all native in a 1 to 2 ratio to achieve more color and blooming sooner. When the amount of sunlight is less than six hours on a patch, partial shade mix is better.
Again, wildflower seeds are typically applied at about 1 pound per 1000 sq ft (a 33 x 33 ft square). For a little patch of 100 sq ft (a 10 x 10 ft square) you only need a couple of ounces, or 2 tenths of an ounce per 3x3 square.
Later, wildflower patch maintenance strategies vary. It is important to weed out any grass or invasives/non-natives in the first few years.
Often cutting/clearing dead heads and stalks in late May is done so that fallen seeds can get some soil contact and light. It may also be appropriate to add new seed at that time for Spring germination and in fall as necessary.
Below we have an example of a patch we planted two years ago with a mix of all native and mostly native. It was a beautiful success with a variety of color and bloom timing in the first year! In the second year the brown-eyed susans became more dominant, so there was less variety of color. For year three, we lightly cleared out leaves and applied a mix of all native to lie there for the Winter to get cold stratified. In Spring, we will cut out some debris and add a little more seed, mostly native. We'll cull out a few brown eyed susies if they continue to dominate too much.
We also offer other planting services such as native design, installation, meadow preparation and maintenance. One great way to reduce a lawn is to create a no-mow zone in a cool shape with paths meandering through the middle! Removing some grass patches and adding wildflowers improves them as well. It often takes vigilance to cull the invasives and grass that may move back in also, which we can help with!
We have worked on large scale wild flower meadows for occaisional mowing and invasives removal. Some folks like to mow them in mid to late May to avoid them getting too tall by year end and to keep saplings at bay. Some folks like to do only half each year, so they don't totally disrupt the creatures there. Various methods and philosophies are worth considering if you endeavor to create a wild flower meadow and maintain it. We even have special mower blades for cutting meadows and the associated tall plants involved. They are called Beast blades and we get them from Australia! Knowing the flowers and processes is the result of years of study and experience, and there are dedicated service professionals who do nothing but meadow establishment and maintenance. I love the simplicity and color of a wild flower patch installed to displace lawn and although it isn't entirely maintenance free, its pretty simple with a high probablity of success!
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More detailed information and links on wild flower meadow practices will be added to this blog entry over time, so feel free to book mark and return. Links to other experts will be included.
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