Wildflower Meadow Attempt

Those are both stunning thanks for posting, if I get 10% of that result Ill be happy.

Ill be planting plenty of yellow rattle seed in the heavily scarified areas, leaving a bit of grass to sow some seeds into and raising plugs in the greenhouse to plant in the grassy areas in Spring, definitely nothing wrong with this stuff anyway its fresh as you can get and he was saying its getting a bit out of control in their fields, clumping together and not letting anything else grow in big patches.

Project update after a fairly backbreaking day out there:

This was what I started with when I bought this house a few months ago, getting rid of the trees was part of the contract due to years of arguments about them between the previous owners and the neighbours, I had no issue with it as I hate these foreign evergreens:

After tree surgery and a few months of strimming and mowing I was left with this, it looks small in the pics but its a big garden and way too much regular mowing for me which is what led me to the wildflower meadow idea:

Scalped the lawn on the lowest setting yesterday and rented this scarifier from Chadwicks and gave it four laps vertical and horizontal in a line from the washing line down to the trees today, just to have a patch of manicured grass in front in case it doesn't work out, Ill do that patch next year if Im happy with this years result:

I took away 5 wheelbarrows of unbelievably heavy thick thatch and was left with deep score marks all over, added 3 kinds of seed mixes that I got at wildflowers.ie down in Thurles on their open day, shady woodland and hedge mix down the back and edges and meadow mixes in the main body and all over, Ill do a separate Yellow Rattle planting day later in the season closer to the first frosts, theres yellow rattle in the mixes anyway to improve my chances:

After that I raked up any loose stuff then just shook the seeds out all over the way we were shown at the open day, pressed them into the soil with a few passes of the spring rake and lots of walking, did all that in the sun and its been pissing rain since I finished so hopefully ideal sowing conditions, no clue if I used too much seed or too little or whether I distributed it equally or not but anywhere I knelt down to look seemed to be well seeded in the scarifier grooves and the seeds seem to have all disappeared a few hours later after the rain with no sign of birds feasting on them so happy with how it went anyway. Cant wait to see how things turn out now:

Species list:

MM09: Field Scabious, Kidney Vetch, Quaking-Grass, St Johnswort. Musk Mallow, Red Campion, White Campion, Wild Carrot, Yarrow, Yellow Agrimony, Yellow Rattle, Salad Burnet, Birdsfoot Trefoil, Black Meddick, Centaury, Corn Marigold, Corn Poppy, Corn Cockle, Cornflower, Cowslip, Lady's Bedstraw, Lesser Knapweed, Marjoram, Mullein, Ox-eye Daisy, Red Bartsia, Red Clover, Ribwort Plantain, Selfheal

MM10: Birdsfoot Trefoil, Black Meddick, Bush Vetch. Corn Marigold, Corn Poppy, Corncockle, Cowslip, Meadow Buttercup, Field Scabious, Kidney Vetch, Lady's Bedstraw, Lesser Knapweed, Marjoram, Eyebright, Mullein, Ox-eye Daisy, Hawksbit, Red Bartsia, Red Campion, Red Clover, St Johnswort, Wild Carrot, Yarrow, Yellow Rattle, Species in small quantities: White Campion, Feverfew, Cornflower, Scentless Mayweed, Birdsfoot Trefoil, Purple Loosestrife, White Bedstraw, Ragged Robin, Selfheal, Yellow Agrimony

EC04 (shady areas): Birdsfoot trefoil, Black Meddick, Burdock, Bluebell, Corn Marigold, Corn Poppy, Corncockle*, Cornflower*, Cowslip, Devils Bit Scabious, Foxglove, Hedge Garlic Mustard, Hemp Agrimony, Hoary Plantain, Cow-Parsley, Lesser Knapweed, Scented Mayweed, Meadowsweet, Mullein, Ox-eye Daisy, Purple Loosestrife, Primrose, Ragged Robin, Red Campion, Ribwort Plantain, Sorrel, St Johnswort, Teasel, Upright Hedge Parsley, Wild Angelica, Wild Carrot, Wood Avens, Sweet Violet, Dog Violet

Thanks, although after the rain has washed the scarifier muck away a bit and the lawn has had a couple of days of sun/showers to recover Im wondering if its still awfully thick to do this properly. Ah well I still have a large amount of yellow rattle seed to sow so Ill make sure to clear a few decent spots for it to get going.

Anybody know where I could get a bundle like this of native hedgerow plants? Waiting for a reply from the site but are they out of season atm? When would you expect to see them back and when would the best time be to plant them? This would be perfect for my place and would hopefully solve my nettle problems at the edges:

Traditional Irish Native Hedgerow Mix (connectingtonature.ie)

Done now thanks.

Thanks, Connecting to nature got back to me after I asked, they're connected to wildflowers.ie and that pack is perfect for my situation, available to order in Mid-Winter apparently:

Hi xxxx,

We expect to have the bareroots back in stock by mid-winter.

I cannot give an exact timeframe yet as the lifting and processing of the trees will be weather dependant.

Bareroot trees and hedging are best sown from November to the end of March.

This is when the trees are in their dormant stage and they can be safely lifted and replanted without damaging them.

At all other times, trees should only be planted if they are already potted.

If you wish, I can add your email to our notification system and you will be notified as soon as they are back in stock.

Hope this helps.

Well its only April and the weather has been absolutely abysmal here in Limerick, literally raining since Christmas but I think this first attempt has failed, the lawn is basically zero difference from if Id skipped all that work scarifying and dethatching and seeding with the wildflower mixes to if Id just skipped mowing it.

Just grass/daisies/dandelions and the odd actual weed like hairy bittercress and creeping buttercup. Maybe the ridiculous amount of rain washed the seeds out or maybe the grass is just too aggressive?

Ill give it another while but Im going to start planning next years attempt now. I think I might just bite the bullet and spray it all off then seed it again.

Did you ever have any success with this strategy?