So if you haven’t done it yet, check out Lauri’s earlier blog post “Creating a Pollinator Haven”. She has had a spectacular wildflower meadow this summer.
My pollinator garden, on the other hand, has been significantly underwhelming. Last year I had a wonderful variety of annuals and perennials that lasted from early spring to late fall.
This year I’ve had some daisies, some California poppies, and a bit of borage. The borage has done a good job attracting the bees but nothing close to the populations of bees, birds, insects and butterflies I had last year.
I think my critical error was that I did not cut the area down last year. I wanted to keep the planting intact for the pollinator population to use for over-wintering. In the Spring, I looked at the area and thought that it looked beat up enough from the weather that it probably did not need a cutting. I also thought that the plants were going to self-sow much more than they did. All these little decisions led to not having a great pollinator area this summer.
Therefore, I’m going to do things differently this Fall. First, I’m going to give it a good chop in late September. I’m going to let the debris sit for a couple of weeks to shake out any seeds and critters, then I’m going to rake up the stalks and I’m also going to scuff up the ground, just a bit, with a leaf rake. Then I’m going to reseed the whole area with a combination of perennial and annual wildflower seeds in mid-October. This should allow the seeds to stratify over winter and be ready to come forth next Spring. I’ll let you know how this works out.
As a quick update, I was discussing this with Lauri, and she is planning to cut her meadow in the Spring, and then overseed with an annual mix.
Since there is a big debate among gardeners about when its best to cut your meadow, Fall vs Spring, it will be very interesting to see if we get varying results. We’ll keep you posted. But remember, whichever way you choose to proceed, you are doing something amazing by having a pollinator area at all, so there is really no wrong answer. Bee Happy!
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