How far have we come! I'm excited to share with you all our first blog post and take this opportunity to recap one of our 2024 project - Creating a Mini Orchard and Wildflower Meadow.
February 2024 The ground has been covered with barrier matting for several months. This was previously an untended area overgrown with brambles, hogweed and other perennial weeds. The aim was to stifle as many of these pernicious weeds as possible before we planted our fruit trees, sowed the wildflower meadow and a grassy seating area.
Late February 2024 Our bare root trees were delivered towards the end of February 2024. We needed to get them in the ground. We could have healed them into the ground as a temporary measure … But on one cold wet Thursday we got planting! We cut out sections from the barrier matting to plant the trees. We wanted to keep the area covered for as long as possible to maximise our aim to wipe out those perennial weeds.
Fruit trees are usually grafted onto a dwarfing rootstock. To prevent the graft rooting we needed to keep the graft a few inches above ground level.
We staked each tree and then used tree guards to stop wildlife from nibbling the fresh young tree bark. We didn’t need to water for a few weeks as the rains continued to fall. We then used bark chippings around the base of the trees to hold in the moisture and we will continue to water regularly for their first year in the ground.
April 2024 In April we finally lifted the barrier matting. There were still some signs of hogweed in particular. So, Charles set too with his fork and spade and dug out all the hogweed roots.
We left the soil bare for a couple of weeks and dug out any emerging weeds. We were now ready to start sowing our wildflower seeds and the new grassy area.
Late April 2024 Seed sowing begins!
Mixing the seed with sand helped us to see where we had sown. We used both an annual wildflower mix to give us flowers this year and a perennial mix for a longer term impact. We also added yellow rattle seed which increases the chances of establishing and maintaining a flower rich meadow by restricting grass growth.
May 2024 With all the rain in late spring and a little sunshine the seeds soon germinated! All the trees are in leaf, and some ( the apples in particular ) blossomed.
We will remove any fruits this year so that the trees can focus their energy into root and branch growth.
And the grass seed germinated well too.
Late June 2024. The daisies and cornflowers dominated our little wildflower area – a beautiful sight. The butterflies arrived on warm days along with the bees!
And it was a great opportunity for the boys to catch up on their news over a
cuppa and some biscuits at our new picnic table on the new grassy area beside
the wildflowers!
Our fruit trees came from: East of England Apples and Orchard Project.
They are based in Fakenham Norfolk. https://www.applesandorchards.org.uk
Our wildflower seed comes from Boston Seeds online https://www.bostonseeds.com
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