My Ever Increasing Wildflower Garden

by DeNEva
(Columbus, OH)

I have a large area on the backside of my shed in the very rear of my yard that looked bare. Since my yard is very large, I didn’t want to plant anything in that area that would take a lot of work because my yard has flowers planted everywhere imaginable already. I didn’t really have any additional time to spend on my flower gardens. So I decided to plant wildflowers. They are a beautiful low maintenance way to add beautiful flowers to any area, and they require a lot less work.

I made sure to do research to find wildflowers that were native to my area, so they would grow without much effort and would also attract native butterflies and birds.

I went to my local garden center and bought packets of native wildflowers. When the flowers in this area started to bloom they were so beautiful that I decided to also plant wildflowers along the my fence in the back of my yard. It has attracted lots of butterflies to my yard and I just love the natural look of the flowers growing just as they would in nature.

This year I’m thinking of planting wildflowers all along the entire length of my fence. Friends that visit just rave about my wildflower garden so I think I’m going to expand it. So I’ll have a much more maintenance free flower garden that I can spend more time enjoying rather than working.

There is an explosion of summer color available in a small seed envelope or even a can for just a few dollars. Of course one can spend a lot more getting a custom mix, but the plain old cans of wildflower seeds in the garden department of the big box stores are beautiful too.

I planted wildflower the first time in between my giant sunflowers to take up the space. I bought one or two envelopes of cheap wildflower seeds to populate the spaces between my sunflowers in a planting area that was about two feet by a hundred and five feet. I was pleasantly surprised at what popped up between the sunflowers. My first planting yielded a natural fence of big green sunflower stalks and leaves topped with giant yellow flowers that were like the fence post caps with the wildflowers acting as the boards of the fence.

I would just stand out there and look at the flowers. I remember looking at my natural fence row once while mowing. I was enjoying the view so much that I went off course with the riding tractor! Up popped blues and yellow, and deep hues of red that were so dark they almost looked like a light brown. The colors up close were velvety in some spots, shiny in other, velvety on this wildflower, and glowing on another.

When choosing what wildflowers to plant, just make sure they are hardy to your region. If they are, and you choose the right spot, many will come back next year! Depends on if you mow them down before they go to seed or not. Look on the can or envelopes to make sure there aren't any varieties that will grow to tall or too short for what you want.

If you have a large area to plant, you can make a place of color that will stop traffic! If you have a tiny spot, the color will still be there in a smaller portion. Try a sprinkling of wildflower seeds this year if you have a spot where you want color, but not have to worry about it.

Wildflower Seed on eBay