Less is more in encouraging wildflowers

Andy Cole is a reiki healer in Middlemarsh. He specialises in planting for healing.

The Photinia Red Robins are doing well at The Potting Shed and flowering wonderfully. The healing energies help focus a cluttered mind. With all the cluttered thoughts going around these energies assist in concentrating the mind on the most important one. I took the time to sit in the community garden among the wildflowers and long grass, listening to the birds singing. In all my years brought up on a farm, living and working in the countryside, working with stock then landscaping and gardening, this has been the first time I have taken the time to sit and actually look at what was around me, not as a field of hay or for silage, or an area

I needed to fence off for the cattle or sheep to graze. I saw buttercups, red clover, plantain, vetches and grass seed heads all swaying in the breeze – what a beautiful, peaceful and inspiring sight. Plantain energies are said to ward off evil spirits, and the plant has significant healing uses. You can also make a herbal tea from the leaves, but please check how to do it properly before you try it. The mixture of grasses reminded me of the old permanent pasture mixes my father used on the farm at home, with Timothy, meadow fescue, and clover. Nature has added her bit over the years with the buttercups, vetches and other wildflowers. This spectacle had been created by a farmer and thrived as it was managed over the years, by cutting it for hay or grazing it. We have now become the custodians of this small parcel of land. We have changed a bit, added bits, but have also left a lot alone as it truly is a special place to relax, unwind and be inspired.

I am mindful that we must not change the management of the wildflower areas so we keep the flora and fauna as it is, so we will graze the area with sheep in the autumn and again in early spring, then allow the area to regenerate all the wildflowers again next year.

If something is working, keep doing the same and it will continue to work. We must remember the countryside we all dearly love and wish to preserve has been created by farmers, their management of the fields and hedgerows combined with the conservation work they do, keep our countryside looking the way it does.

During the recent meditation evening the wildflower meadow was used for a walking meditation. A lot of the participants walked around barefoot and enjoyed the natural reflexology as well as the meditation. Please follow The Potting Shed on Facebook for details of the next event. I am off to dig a small veg patch and plant some runner beans – you can’t beat homegrown produce.