Starting out
Starting to grow wildflowers for the first time?
Simple, just follow these steps for success:
- Prepare the ground correctly.
- Sow the seeds or plant the plants according to the instructions provided.
- Wait as the seeds germinate and the plants grow.
- Enjoy the beautiful wildflowers, then cut and remove the cuttings at the end of summer.
Lose Yourself in the Experience of Flora
Novices should follow our instructions so that growing wildflowers is simple and effective. With our guidance, we promise that nature will thrive on your plot as soon as wildflowers bloom. For a deeper learning experience try our ‘Picker’ it’s an educational journey that helps you plan and grow.
Test yourself, are you a Novice?
There are many common mistakes you can make and some silly things that people believe too. Answer the below questions and see how you do.
True or False?
- You should add fertiliser, compost and manure to a site before sowing
- You should kill all roots and weed seeds before sowing
- Some wildflower seeds germinate in 4 days
- If sowing into existing grass you should only sow in autumn
- Bees will eat the petals of your flowers
The answer to all of these questions (except the last one) is both true and false, depending on your site and situation. Every wild flora is different on every site, it’s even different across the same plot.
As for bees eating flower petals, that’s just false. However, when bees pollinate flowers the flowers will fade and seeds will start to form. So when the flowers disappear, don’t get disappointed that the bees ate them, instead be happy that the cycle of nature is occurring as intended.
It’s for a good reason we say ‘Don’t Rush’, take the time to learn with our website and this Grower’s Manual and you’ll soon know everything you need to to grow wildflowers.
Getting the Best Out of Wildflowers
To get the best out of wildflowers you should take the time to learn about them, try to understand why they are not the same as grass, lettuce or commercially bred flowers. Wildflowers are native strains of plants that have been growing for years in the wild, so unlike commercial flowers they have evolved to survive and thrive whatever the conditions rather than to have a single perfect display that then dies off completely. You should temper your expectations, making unreal demands of natural processes can cause disappointment. Avoid ‘Chocolate Box Photos’ and the expectations they inspire.
We say, Get to know your site, discover its advantages and disadvantages and accept them. Work with nature to over come the, often many, short falls of your situation to grow beautiful flowers, and better still, make sustainable low maintenance spaces for nature.
Plan Ahead
When it comes to wildflowers the most important thing is quality seed or plants. After that a bit of simple advice and some maintenance is all that is required.
Know your wildflower supplier, in Ireland the industry is unregulated and many suppliers make claims that are not true. Check the provenance of any seed before you buy, the term ‘Native’ is fraught with falsehoods. We show failures and success. we are Farmers & Gardeners, not marketers.
Rest assured, all our products are delivered with In-house Traceability, we have records over decades as to where every wild plant was sourced, grown and even sown. We don’t keep customers names, just the regional postal address and this anonymous data will be handed over to the National Botanic Gardens for in time, our records my be the only true source of collected wildflora and when climate change hits home, we may need to find those genetics.
We are the first firm in the world to offer a three year guarantee on seed mixtures, before and after photos must be provided
Our wholly Irish grown, DAFM certified wildflower seed is annually tested in Ireland and our many, varied customers have proven our products grow and develop into biodiverse floras in Ireland.
On the other hand, your guide, author, and owner of Design by Nature, Sandro, is uncertified. He’s brash, his provenance is dodgy and he’s certainly not native!
He is, however, Ireland’s leading wildflower growing expert, as judged by his peers in the industry. His life’s work has influenced the global industry and you may find that many others have just adopted his ground breaking ideas, copied his products and taken text from this website to call their own.
All meadows change over the seasons and each year brings new flushes of flowers.
If you follow our most basic instructions for your particular product you will establish a perennial meadow by the summer of the third or fourth year. In the long term, as fertility gets locked up in the perennial plants’ roots, all the plants start to reduce in height and vigour. This then allows more species to spread and contribute to what should be an ever changing, but familiar, experience.
Many customers get disappointed when grass takes over, some may even abandon the project.
If this happens, don’t give up. All you have to do is cut the meadow more often. You should understand that grass eventually arrives in all meadows, even if they are originally sown without grass seeds. In July the main crop of grasses will be in full flower. On most sites, without Yellow Rattle, these grasses dominate for about three weeks, they will flower and set seed and then die back.
The grass seed heads will fall off and the grass will turn to golden hay. After this more flowers will start to bloom.
If grass is a problem, just cut it, but not too low and remove the cuttings. If grass invasion remains a problem you should cut it more times per growing season.
This is all fully explained in detail in the Meadow Maintenance section.
Understanding Your Site for the Best Results
Our general seed mixtures are designed for simplicity, affordability, long flowering, and to attract wildlife. Typically they suit sunny sites with normal, dry soil with a pH range of 5.5 – 7.5.
As every region has different soil types, climate and moisture levels, so too does every site have a different set of requirements based on the owner’s expectations. If using general wildflower mixtures and simplified, general information you may only get so far.
Our experience tells us that while meadows are established simplistically, few species survive uneducated, simplistic approaches.
So you’re saying your products don’t match up?
Yes, it’s customers’ behaviour that establishes flora. We can only supply, suggest, inspire and hope. Our products are certified, tested and of proven native Irish provenance, but we can only do so much.
After germination is secured, it’s the site conditions, human aspirations and maintenance that determines what will survive in a meadow. It’s good to know, wildflowers germinate and grow at different rates.
Some will grow and die quickly, others spread fast and eventually die out, while some of the very best grow slowly and take years to fully flower and spread. Many weave a niche for themselves in an ever changing flora. It helps to understand that it takes more than a few years for native plants to fully grow and settle in.
When a species does find it’s niche there are very many factors that will or will not help it’s survival. When different species germinate from a seed mixture, many will not continue to grow unless conditions are perfect. Even if planting plants to by-pass the seed sowing stages issues can arise that will greatly effect the outcome.
As we said, Management & Maintenance also effects what survives. We always recommend matching the best species to your site and situation. The more species that can survive the site conditions, so that no matter what management follows, the better the chances of maintain a meadow or flora.
We design species diversity into our products. Our products are proven to perform best when each species plays its part. If through poor selection, simplistic choice or inadequate maintenance a few species fail, the opportunity for those species to regulate the developing ecology are greatly reduced.
Before we get stuck into the Grower’s Manual, we’ll quickly explain.
Cheap to produce, quick growing Annual species are often included in wildflower mixtures. They shelter tiny perennials so, shaded from direct, strong sunlight, they can germinate safely. These are known as nurse crops. Biennial species tend to be upright, stiff and tall, when they grow in the second year they help to hold the meadow upright. Both of these types are pioneer species, colonisers and opportunists. Without them soil would not exist.
Wildflower meadows without Annuals and Biennials need constant cutting for two years to establish the perennials. This means no first year flowers and fewer flowers in the early years other than short growing ones which, when given an opportunity, will smother the slower perennials.
Believe us, it’s nature’s way. All ecologies start with pioneer species which assist more climax species to survive and form what we now understand as Perennial Permanent Meadows.
Most of our seed mixtures include pioneer, nurse and other functioning species, even if some ecologists think that adding certain of these fleeting species is wrong. We answer that by saying they are only looking at what nature is in the present, we have to establish an ecosystem in a garden or landscape by understanding how you arrive at the ‘present’.
ScaryCrow Says : Did you know , in the 1990’s, our seeds were once exported to help fund and save Ireland ‘s flora, as few in Ireland wanted to grow them and there were no funds to assist us. so we exported to many countries, with a ‘world’s first’ message (circa) ‘save the local flora in your own area’ that we printed on the seed packets, as a ware to alert the worlds gardeners of the decline of native species.
