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growing wildflowers in a raised bed

edited June 2023 in Plants
hi guys - looking for some advice. I'm considering putting some wildflower seeds (well, bee friendly one's, but I guess the advice is the same) into a raised bed. I currently have one tomato plant one one side of the bed - but the rest is empty. I did consider putting another couple of tomato plants in the empty area - but decided against that as I'm growing determinate this year - and these tend to do better in taller pots, in my experience

I have a couple of queries

a) is it too late to plant out the wildflower seeds?

and 

b) around a month ago, I prepared the raised beds with lots of decent compost, manure and topped it off with mulch. everything I've read about growing these plants suggest poor soil is best. I did have a thought about topping the bed with a layer of seed compost and scattering the seeds on top of that. do you reckon that'd work?

I'm quite keen to get something going, but am wondering whether it's best to hold off til autumn

if that's the case - I guess I could lob a load of nasturtium seeds in to fill out the bed and add some colour

thanks in advance 

Posts

  • nutcutletnutcutlet Posts: 27,445
    1. Are you looking to grow pretty annuals 'for the bees' or wildflowers for the good of wildlife in general?
    2 Wildflowers don't need poor soil, if you can find me a patch of good soil with no wildflowers in it I'll be very surprised. 
    3. not too late to grow some quick annuals


    In the sticks near Peterborough
  • CeresCeres Posts: 2,698
    Go for it. If you are going to include some perennial wildflowers in the mix then they will have their roots down and be ready for flowering next year if they don't manage it this summer.
    I have done something similar with a raised bed but included meadow grass as well. The rain this spring caused the grass to grow like crazy so at present it is all a bit overgrown but I have ox eye daisies just about to flower and some red clover in bloom whilst the spring saw tulipa sylvestris nodding over the grass. It's an experiment so I'm not expecting anything wonderful, but it's interesting.
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