My front garden is about 6 square metres and on a slight slope. At the moment it is bare earth as I have taken a long time to decide what to do with it. It is on a slight incline and gets the sun in the afternoon. I have finally decided I want a sort of mini wild flower meadow but am not sure if it will take here so looking for any advice if anyone else has grown one. Is it to late to plant now this year? Is there a specific good mix I can buy. In particular does anyone know where I can buy a small amount of the seed needed online, so far the sites I have looked at only sell vast amounts much to much for my needs I think. I would prefer organic if possible but I suppose not really necessary. I am looking to attract bees and butterfly and generally would like something that is pretty for as long as possible in the summer. Also once grown how often should it be cut and when?

thanks for looking

Rachel

Hi Rachel,

I saw some packets of seeds in Oxfam under the fairtrade section the other day that were specifically for bees and some other packets for butterflies.  I’ve got a raised section in my front garden that I am currently planning to turn into a wildflower section to attract the bees and various wildlife.  Wildflowers will be fine growing in a garden that gets the sun only in the afternoon and will come up pretty quickly, unless we continue to have the eternal winter that we seem to be having!!!

I bought some seeds from the garden centre the other day to put in a small, unused area of my garden.  They are ok to sow now according to the instructions on the back, so am planning to put them in tomorrow.  We are due a spell of nice, warm, summery weather this week, so hopefully they will be able to get going.  Even if you are looking to plant a mix with grass in it, I would have thought it would still be fine, but would need to be well watered.  I would take my cue from when the farmers cut the fields of mowing grass for when you need to cut it.  They do it twice a year here, early and late summer.

Things like poppies, cornflowers, wild scabious can all just be scattered around and with a bit of luck and sun will germinate quickly and self seed again next year.
They will look so pretty xx

There was a piece about growing wild flower meadow on the Chelsea Flower Show on BBC2 yesterday - I expect it will be on Iplayer.

Angie

Thanks all and Angie. I found the show and will watch it later x