Creating a Wildflower Area in Your Garden – Which is Best, Seeds or Turf?

Creating a wildflower meadow affect in your garden has never been more popular. With biodiversity ever decreasing and a growing emphasis on nature recovery, many people are beginning to realise the potential of their gardens to help this process and contribute in a positive way.

Wildflowers are a fantastic way to do this. For a start, pollinators such as butterflies and bees are strongly attracted to them, and as these are vital to all life on the planet, increasing their numbers has to be a top priority.

But it is not just pollinators. Other insects are attracted too, which in turn attract birds. Before you know it, your garden will become a haven for wildlife – just what is needed to start turning around the biodiversity crisis the UK is facing.

Of course, it is not just wildlife that benefits from a wildflower garden. Your outdoor space will be filled with vibrant colour and beautiful aromas, making it a place you will want to spend more time in. And taking time to stop and enjoy your garden, particularly given the busy and stressful lives we all lead nowadays, can do wonders for your mental health.

All in all, including wildflowers in your garden, whether in the margins and beds or in your lawn, has multiple benefits for you and for the environment. No wonder it is becoming so popular.

Two Ways to Create a Wildflower Garden

The best way to produce a spectacular wildflower garden is a hot topic of debate. Ultimately, there are two main ways to achieve this, both of which have their pros and cons. The first is simply to sow wildflower seeds and hope that they propagate, eventually becoming healthy wildflowers that fill your garden with colour and perfume.

The second is to lay wildflower turf or matting in which propagation has already taken place, meaning much of the hard work is already done.

So, which is the best? In this article, we take a look.

Wildflower Seeds

On the face of it, simply sowing seeds would seem the easiest and most cost effective way to create a wildflower area in your garden. After all, all you need to do is scatter handfuls of seeds on to the soil, give them a drop of water, and before you know it your garden will be alive with colour.

Well, perhaps, if you’re lucky! Although this can work, it is seldom that simple.

Whereas there are certainly some benefits of using seeds to create a wildflower area or meadow effect in your garden, the reality is wildflowers can be difficult to propagate from seeds. In fact, many gardening experts even find this hard.

Partly the reason for this is that you have to match the seed variety with your soil type, which is not always easy. Not doing this, however, is likely to lead to the seeds failing to propagate, or if they do, not growing.

If you do decide to attempt growing wildflowers from seeds, you must start with a bare patch of ground that is free from weeds. Sowing should be done in mid-spring or early autumn, and is easily achieved by simply scattering handfuls of seed.

There is no need to add fertiliser, even if the soil is nutrient-poor, but it is vital to keep the area watered. It is also vital to ensure that any weeds that appear are dealt with because it you don’t, you will have problems. Weeds and weed grasses are fast growing and if you let them develop, they will out-compete your wildflowers and suffocate them, which can be very disheartening.

One thing to note is that if you intend on creating a wildflower meadow effect in your lawn, you can’t simply scatter seeds on it and expect them to grow. This is because the seedlings have to completed with the more mature grasses in the lawn, which they simply won’t be able to do.

Creating a Wildflower Meadow from Seeds

Whereas it might be possible to create a wildflower patch from seeds, creating an entire meadow effect, which is becoming more and more popular, is a far more in depth process that requires months of preparation.

Often, the top layer of soil will need to be removed to reveal the less fertile soil below. This stops the wildflower seedlings from being overwhelmed by the vigorous weeds and grasses that will inevitably grow.

Some people even sow mustard or oil-seed rape for a season first to use up excess nutrients in the soil, but they must be removed before dropping their seeds.

Any weeds must be dug out completely, roots and all, and a fork used to get rid of any clumps of earth to prepare a seed bed. This then needs to be left for four to six weeks to give any weeds that are left time to germinate, so they can be hoed off. Only then can the wildflower seeds be sown.

Once they are in, water them regularly and remove any weeds that come through to stop them outcompeting the wildflowers.

Wildflower turf

Laying turf is an alternative way to create a wildflower space in your garden, or to create a wildflower meadow effect. Unsurprisingly, it has its pros and cons when compared to using seeds, and it is up to the individual to decide which approach is best.

The main disadvantages of turf is it is more expensive than buying a packet of seeds. However, there are a number of advantages that make turf a serious consideration.

Firstly, the hard work has been done for you. That is, by the time you take delivery of the turf, the seedlings will have all germinated and are on their way to becoming beautiful, mature wildflowers.

This is a significant benefit. The biggest complaint we hear about wildflower seeds is that people struggle to get them past the germination phase due to selecting the wrong varieties for their soil, or due to the soil being too rich and promoting the growth of weeds and grasses over the flowers.

With turf, the right varieties have been matched to the growing medium, meaning establishment is not an issue and as long as the turf is watered, the flowers will grow.

Another advantage of wildflower turf is that the matting helps prevent weeds and grasses growing and outcompeting the flowers, again solving a major problem compared to growing from seeds.

Wildflower turf is easy to lay and to cut into different shapes for borders and other parts of your garden, making it versatile to use. It will also produce result more quickly, and you’re not restricted to when you can lay it, unlike planting seeds. In fact, as long as the ground is not frozen, turf can be laid.

Finally, one area where choosing turf over seeds will significantly reduce your workload is in creating a wildflower meadow in your lawn area. Simply prepare the area and roll the turf out. It couldn’t be easier. If you simply want the area to look beautiful, with as much colour as possible, select a full wildflower turf. If you want to still be able to walk on it and have children play on your lawn, choose a species-rich turf which does contain some grasses. This can be kept neat by cutting it like a traditional lawn, but leaving it to grow out a bit will show it off to full effect, while still enabling it to be used.

Seeds or Turf, Which is Best?

So, as we can see, there are pros and cons of using both seeds and turf when creating a wildflower area or meadow in your garden. Some seeds can be cheaper, but they must be matched with your soil type and can only be sown at certain times of the year. Often, they struggle to germinate if weeds or other plants are nearby.

Turf gives quicker and more consistent results as the flower varieties are matched to the growing medium and propagation has already taken place by the time your receive the turf. Although lifting turf and moving it around can add to physical demands of creating a wildflower meadow, the ground takes less work to prepare and the turf matting stops pesky weeds and grasses from choking the wildflowers.

In the end, the decision is of course an individual one, but in our view, there is no easier and more consistent way to achieve that coveted wildflower effect than with turf.

Ensure it is Plastic Free

Whichever type of turf you choose – wildflower or species rich – it is vital that you buy plastic-free. Some turfs are still grown on a plastic mesh that breaks down in the soil to become microplastics. This pollutes the soil and can even get into local watercourses. In our view, this practice is unacceptable in 2024 and is damaging to the environment.

That is why we have innovated better ways to grow turf, meaning all our wildflower and species rich turfs are completely plastic free. You can find out more about our wildflower turf here, and for more information on our species-rich turf, click here.