Wildflower Garden

The seed packet shows poppies and cornflowers in a blaze. You scatter it over a patch of lawn, water it faithfully, and by August you have thick, tufty grass, a few docks and one apologetic cornflower. Nothing was wrong with the seed. A meadow wants poor soil rather than rich, a hay cut rather than a weekly mow, and patience measured in years. Get those right and meadows are not difficult at all. Wildflower Garden explains how to plan, sow and look after a meadow that offers food and shelter to bees, butterflies, moths and seed-eating birds, at whatever size suits you. It is built on three principles: keep fertility low, sow the right seed for the place, and make the annual cut. It also reports the wildlife evidence as it stands, which is encouraging enough without exaggeration. What you’ll find inside • The four kinds of planting (cornfield annuals, perennial meadows, flowering lawns and prairie-style) and how to choose • Planning, testing and lowering soil fertility, and clearing perennial weeds before you sow • Buying native-origin seed, reading a mix, and the questions to ask a supplier • Sowing windows, seed rates given as ranges, and a step-by-step sowing method • Yellow rattle, the little plant that weakens grasses, and turning a lawn into a meadow or flowering lawn • Plug plants, wildflower turf, green hay and mini-meadows in containers • A directory of meadow flowers, cornfield annuals and grasses, with heights, soils, wildlife value and cautions • The first year, the hay cut and aftercare, and leaving refuges for wildlife • Problem plants and the law, including ragwort, plus tools, ticks, hedgehogs and safe cutting • A meadow calendar, troubleshooting tables, figures at a glance and a glossary Who it’s for If you have never sown a wildflower, start at the…