What to plant now to have a meadow lawn by next spring

The traditional green lawn is dead (literally, in some cases). Val Bourne advises on how to replace it with a sustainable and beautiful alternative

There is a quiet revolution going on in our gardens. The pristine lawn, with stripes laid out like deckchair canvas, is being partially replaced by longer grass studded with flowers. It’s not a new idea. The seeds were sown in 1870 when Irish gardener and journalist William Robinson published The Wild Garden, his personal antidote to strait-laced, formally laid out Victorian bedding.

Many seriously-minded gardeners emulated Robinson’s romantic style and one of his acolytes was Daisy Lloyd, who began to enhance the meadows at family property Great Dixter in East Sussex in 1912. Her son Christopher was born in 1921, a time of great natural abundance, and the two would set out with basket and trowel to scour the nearby lanes for choice hardy orchids.

This practice is illegal today, and rightly so, because our native flora and fauna have suffered devastating declines since the Second World War. A 2021 study, published by scientists from London’s Natural History Museum, concluded that the UK had lost almost half of its natural diversity. Climate change and the widespread use of herbicides and pesticides have seen our country relegated to 189th in a list of 218 of the most nature-depleted countries.

Today’s gardeners are among those trying to revive our natural abundance and they have an excellent role model. King Charles III’s Highgrove Garden in Gloucestershire is totally organic, with meadows and bulb lawns surrounding the house. Highgrove’s florally rich meadow contains more than 70 native species, and in 2012 he initiated 60 Coronation Meadows to commemorate the late Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee. Professors James Hitchmough and Nigel Dunnett wooed the public that same year with their Olympic Park meadows.

You don’t need a vast acreage and you certainly don’t need to skim off the soil surface with mechanical machinery, as many early meadow makers advocated. For one thing, the top layer will contain a valuable seedbank unique to your area.

You don’t need to be in the countryside either: city and town gardens can be rich in wildlife. When the London Natural History Society surveyed Buckingham Palace’s 39-acre garden in 1996 and 1997, it identified 322 species of wildflower, 2,160 species of insect and 207 other invertebrates. Scientists also found 30 species of bird breeding there, with a similar number recorded in large city squares and Royal Parks.

NOW’S THE TIME TO START

The Merlin of the hay meadow is the bee-friendly annual Rhinanthus minor, known as yellow rattle because, once pollinated, the seeds ripen and rattle, before tumbling out onto the ground. As a hemiparasitic plant that feeds on grass roots, thinning out the sward to create space for wildflowers, it’s a meadow essential. Landlife Wildflowers (wildflower.co.uk) is selling seeds harvested this year.

Choose a bright, open spot and mow the grass as low as you can. Using a metal-tined rake, scrape the soil surface then sprinkle the seeds. Carefully tread the seeds into the ground and, as winter gives way to spring, seedlings looking rather like flat dark-green Christmas trees will appear.

You can start small, or do a whole area. In the second year, your own yellow rattle seeds will fall and germinate.

GET PLUGGED IN

You can raise your own plants from freshly collected seeds, but perennial native flowers are also available as plugs. You could purchase enough for the entire area, but if that isn’t feasible, opt for 10 or so. Don’t spread them through the grass at this stage though: plant them in a cluster in some spare ground in a warm position. This method will allow you to collect the seeds far more easily and then these fresh seeds can be sown as soon as they are ripe in August or September. Most will germinate in the following spring and seedlings can be pricked out for planting out in autumn. Once planted, just let them self-seed.

‘You don’t need a vast acreage and you don’t need to be in the countryside’ VAL BOURNE

ESSENTIAL MAINTENANCE

Mow around or through your meadow, because this makes the area look like it should be there. Do it after seeds are set and remove the clippings within a day or so, to keep fertility low.