I took a different approach to wildflower gardening this year, by buying
individual packs of garden wildflowers that I knew, or suspected, would do
well here in the inland Northwest, and were capable of long blooming
seasons. I had some winners and losers.
In late March or early April, I sowed shirley poppies, opium poppies,
california poppies, linaria, baby blue eyes, foam flower, red and blue flax
larkspur and bachelor buttons, dame's rocket, sweet alyssum, godetia,
chinese forget-me-nots, and russell hybrid lupines. In late April or early
May I sowed cosmos, four o-clocks, and lavatera, black-eyed susans, annual
phlox, scarlet runner beans, and morning glories.
First to bloom were the alyssum and linaria. (By early May). By late May,
linaria and california poppies were starting to bloom, and shortly after,
red flax. The baby blue eyes and foam flowers started to flower the first
week of June. The foam flowers were disappointing, short bloom season and
not showy. The baby blue eyes were pretty but also a short-season bloomer.
All this while, the poppy plants were growing and growing, but not blooming
Finally, about mid-June they started to burst open, and by the end of the
month completely dominated the wildflower bed. A few straggly larkspur began
to bloom in early July (not a great success) and the bachelor buttons and
godetia by mid-july. The chinese forget-me-nots began to bloom around the
same time. Self-sown feverfew began to bloom in late July, around the time
the poppies were giving out. The annual phlox bloomed starting in mid-july
also. The black-eyed susan began to bloom in early august, and the cosmos
shortly afterward - the lavatera about the same time. Still blooming in
mid-september are a few straggling poppy blossoms (most plants were pulled
in early august), cosmos, black-eyed susan, a bird-planted sunflower,
bachelor buttons, a few straggly godetias, some feverfew, scarlet runner
beans on a tripod, four-o-clocks (not too many - also not a great success) a
few straggly california poppies,chinese forge-me-nots and the lavateras. I
will be very curious to see which of these wildflowers will return next
year. I plan to pull most of the plants in the next few weeks, and get busy
weeding all the grass, dandelions, etc, out of the bed.
The advantage this year of planting by individual seed packets was having
some degree of control of the heights of plants, (it was a parking strip),
so that the taller plants were in the middle and the shorter ones on the
sidewalk and street sides of the bed. Next year of course, it will all be
mixed up, so I imagine some of the shorter plants will get shaded out before
they can bloom, if they reseed at all. I'm going to try to be pretty
ruthless next year in using the cultivating claw to thin the wildflower
seedlings, but I know I usually let too many survive.
In terms of gardening impact, the high-season of Shirley poppy bloom
was the most dramatic, followed by the current time with the cosmos,
lavatera and black-eyed susans. But the poppy plants turn skanky pretty
quickly as their bloom time ends, and that means a full day in the heart of
summer heat yanking up plants and stuffing them in a garbage can or bag. If
your garden area is near the woods or other unkempt area, you could leave
them, but not in a garden which is trying to look halfway civilized....lol