Mini wild flower meadow

[cire]

New build house with very wet, clay like soil. Some of it is in glorious sunshine most of the day and some in shade for more of the day than not. I want to get about 2/3 m deep of grass dug up across the far back fence the full width of the garden and fill it with wild flowers and Edge it off with railway sleepers. Or should I just edge the area off, scatter wildflower seeds and let the grass do it's thing?
Any suggestions on good wildflower mixes to use?

Seedling will struggle amongst grass. Better to strip the turf

I've tried to do a wildflower area down the edge of my garden, just dug up the turf, scattered seeds and let whatever happened happen. First year it was full of poppies, second just one honesty plant and then the rest was oxeye daisies which can apparently be a bit of a pest and take over. This year I'm going to semi-start again by digging over now, which probably isn't the best time but hey-ho, and being a bit more selective with what seeds I put in. I think the mixes you can buy cheap have lots of oxeye daisies in so that may be something to look out for.

I've also been told that some meadow flowers like poppies will only come up if the soil has been dug over a bit.

In terms of edging I wanted it to kind of naturally flow into my lawn with a view to only mowing a path down the middle but that hasn't happened yet so I'll probably create a more formal edge so mowing is easier.

Thanks for those tips. It won't cost a huge amount more to get the gardener to dig that strip of turf as I'm asking him dig out for a trampoline area to bark off so I will go for that. Also handy to know which flowers (weeds!) to avoid. I love poppies so will look for that in the mix.
Should I look at some better quality top soil to go on top of the clay?

We’ve used Pictorial Meadows Woodland Edge on clay soil. It looks lovely now but it has been an enormous amount of work.

Oh wow @cathyandclare is that yours?? So stunning!

I agree with PP, it's rarely a case of sticking down a few seeds as a few thugs take over. I've resorted to growing from seed in the greenhouse and planting out in my meadow border. Good luck though - it's a lovely idea!

That looks amazing @cacathyandclare What did you do that proved successful? We have clay soil - any tips?

We had to hand pull vast numbers of weeds - but the main job is cutting and clearing the meadow once or twice a year which depletes the soil ( which bizarrely is good).

Priimroses, cowslips, foxgloves, bluebells and red campion do brilliantly. Poppies come and go but don't flourish .

You can buy wildflower meadow turf which is more expensive but you can strip your turf off and lay the new.

Starting a wildflower plot from seed is actually tricky. Lawn type grasses and many weeds will compete with them and they will struggle so you need to dig your bed, weed it ander things grow for a season and keep weeding until you are confident you've no weeds left then the next season sew your wild flower seeds. Good advice is to mark out a grid and sew in the lines so as the seedlings grow you know anything not in the lines is a weed to be pulled. One they have grown fully you won't be able to see the grid and it will look like a joyful jumble.

Remember you'll have a mix usually of perennial and annual. Annual will flower the year you plant and you'll rely on them self seeding for future years, perennials will establish in your first year and flower the year after. It can take 2 or even 3 years to really see what you've got.

I'm no natural gardener so maybe I need a very hardy mix? My grandma grew the most amazing foxgloves when I was a child so seeing those is a great memory.

I've also been told that some meadow flowers like poppies will only come up if the soil has been dug over a bit. That’s because poppies aren’t meadow flowers, they’re cornfield flowers. There’s a whole lot of cornfield weeds - cornflower, corn marigold, poppy for example - which are annuals, and need clear ground to germinate as they’re not much good at competition. They are the basis of many wildflower mixes.

Meadows are used for growing hay, ie grass, so flowers have to be able to compete, and are mainly perennial. Difficult to establish in existing grass, so you can get seeds packets which are a mixture of grass and things like buttercup, self heal. Also to be sown on bare, unfertile soil. Usually have some cornfield plants for first year impact, but they won’t persist.

Yes that's what I was told @MereDintofPandiculation I'd forgotten the reason!

I've got foxgloves popping up all over where I don't want them and none where I do this year, typical!

I have had some success with nee and butterfly mixed seeds from m&s, but they are mostly annuals. I have also used mixed seeds from Waitrose, but only really worked for one year. Nothing came back except the ox eyes! Reading this thread has been helpful and explained a lot, thanks.

I've just put one in this weekend and now you've all got me worried!

It’s really hard to do. And as cathyandclaire says a lot of work. They are clearing it once or twice a year and starting over. Unless you are willing to do the work I’d honestly not bother. I’d plant some stuff you like and go from there.

I tried this on an area of my garden. The grass was already dead as we'd had a storage container on it for 6 months while building. I removed the rest of the grass, raked it all, sprinkled it with two huge sacks of wildflower grass seed and lovingly put a find layer of seed compost and gently kept it watered. All we got was grass and the odd flower here and there. This year quite a few grape hyacinths have come up so far but really it's just grass!

Another recommendation for pictoral meadows but as others have said, you need to be able to recognise perenial weeda and pull them out of the meadow or they will take over and you will end up with a meadow full of brambles/dock/ bindweed/ etc. Pictoral meadows do turf which might be easier?

Definitely strip the grass. And add yellow rattle to your seed mix to help keep returning grass indeed control. Choose proper wild meadow flower seeds (a lot of the mixes are ornamentals that need more work to keep them going) that are suitable for your soil and conditions.

You can get low growing mixes that you mow every 6 weeks, which are less spectacular than the tall types but the mowing stops a lot of the thugs taking over. If you go for a tall, no-mow mix you still need to mow at the end of summer and a few times through the winter to stop things like brambles moving in. The end of summer mow is best done with a strimmer and the cutting left in the area and trampled in for a few days to get the seeds out before you rake the trimmings away.

We got ours from https://wildflowerlawnsandmeadows.com/wild-flower-seeds-for-sale/

(Link to seed page because the home page has an annoying autoplay video. They do also to plug plants and turf, though, which will establish faster - we used seeds and it took a couple of years to get going.)

I forgot to mention I need cat friendly flowers as well. I feel like my vision and the reality are going to be very different from one another!

I’m sowing a Summer bee friendly ‘meadow’ in a disused raised bed. I got the idea from a National Trust garden.
it’s a mixture of annuals, Cosmos, Larkspur, Nigella, poppies etc.
Early days, but if it succeeds I’ll post a photo. Much easier than a wild flower meadow, but they might self sow as well.