Bad thoughts about wildflower meadow seed mixes
A long answer to a (not so) simple question: “What is a good wildflower seed mix that you recommend for creating a wildflower meadow?”
It is an excellent question, but we always cringe when people ask for good seed mix recommendations because it is difficult to answer. Establishing a wildflower meadow or “pocket prairie” from seed would seem like an easy, natural way to create a patch of pollinator habitat from scratch, but it is unfortunately not easy.
The problem with seed mixes are numerous. They contain too many species to establish simultaneously. Most contain species inappropriate for Georgia, namely the non-native common milkweed, which threatens to become invasive in Georgia. They are slow to establish, and the weed pressures become prohibitive. If you are creating a wildflower meadow for pollinator and bird habitat, it is essential to choose Georgia species.
Seed mixes usually contain well over 20 plant species. These species all compete at once for space, water and light. Generally, only three or four will germinate and survive to full size. This might be fine if you want to throw a bunch of seeds on the ground and see what kind of soil you have, but it seems like a recipe for wasting time and resources.
Further, seed mix species selections are incompatible with one another—you end up with a giant plant growing right on top of a 2-foot plant. The 2-foot plant doesn’t stand a chance. Imagine ironweed growing quickly, broadly and 8 feet tall in a season, growing beside butterfly milkweed.
When working to enhance a grassland or wildflower meadow, we like to first establish the species in sets with matrix species or “space holder” species—like mints, small goldenrods and smallsized warm-season grasses. We would bring in smaller wildflowers next and wait until these early sets of wildflowers and grasses are well established and growing soundly before bringing in larger wildflowers and grasses.
Perennials are slow to establish from seed on site. Many meadow grasses and wildflowers grow deep roots, some as deep as 6 to 10 feet before flowering. You might not see your target wildflowers for years. When we have time pressure to establish our target species, we find
4 State Botanical Garden of Georgia
Heather Alley, conservation horticulturist Jennifer Ceska, conservation coordinator
that establishing a wildflower meadow or pocket prairie takes too long from seed. What are the time pressures? The needs of native pollinators and other wildlife are significant. Georgia wildlife needs sun-loving native wildflowers on the ground now.
The other time pressure comes from the competition of weeds. If our target plants do not hold a site, weedy colonizing species and nonnative invasive species will move in and take over. When establishing plants on Georgia soils, weeds will have equal opportunity alongside the wildflowers. Weeds usually win the race. The biggest challenge in establishing a wildflower meadow from scratch is weeds.
Unfortunately, prepping a new site for meadow seeds creates a blank canvas for an inevitable wicked dose of weeds. Options for weed control are hand weeding, selective and carefully timed herbicide application, and strategic mowing. As mentioned above, working to establish wildflowers from seeds can take too long for the needs of Georgia wildlife and too long to lose the competition from weedy competitive plants. We need to establish these plants faster.
We recommend planting potted perennials whenever possible if you are starting from scratch. Consider using plugs, strategize your planting by height and clump species together in patches. This is essentially planting a native perennial border. If you let the wildflowers go to seed on site, they will spread through time, creating your wildflower meadow.
Plugs of planted wildflowers give your plants a big head start establishing on-site over seed sowing. The native perennial wildflowers will begin seeding in before you know it. If your site is too large to plant exclusively, try seeding in some matrix species, plants that will hold the site for you, like Little Bluestem. Then start planting small patches of a few wildflower species and let them go to seed. In grassland restoration, we call these “seeding-in plots.” For example, in our 11-acre grassland restoration, we love the results of seeding little bluestem and splitbeard bluestem. Once those are established, we add flower diversity over time, a few per year.
If you want to dive deeper into meadow establishments and pocket prairies, visit https://www.ernstseed.com/help-guides/obstacles-to-a-successfulmeadow-establishment/.
SUMMER 2023 5
LITTLE BLUESTEM BLACK-EYED SUSAN
GOLDENROD