Subject: Wildflower Meadows Questions

From: [email-masked] (Kate Maskar)
Date: 1 Apr 1995 22:55:34 GMT

My spousal unit and I bought a house in lower Delaware a couple of
years ago and discovered the following spring that the slopes leading
down to the pond grew hundreds of coreopsis (the lance-leaved variety)
and lots of ox-eye daisies. This is a pretty unruly landscape, mind
you--there's lots of mint encroaching everywhere, along with some kind
of grasses that are golden yellow and grow in 3 ft high clumps and a
host of unidentifiable weeds. Also planted on this slope is crown vetch,
some creeping junipers and some large patches of oregano and thyme. My
questions: should I be mowing the slopes in the fall (to release seeds
and get rid of the countless pine seedlings and rose-of-sharon outlaws
that crop up)? Sould I be raking the oak leaves (there's thousands) that
land there in the fall? The first year I cleaned up lots of leaves
(thinking they would smother the coreopsis/daisies/etc. and I had lots
of bloom; the second year I was lazier and the bloom was much
diminished, but it was also an unusually cold winter for this area and
there was a lot of die-off due to temperatures. Any advice (about any of
the above plants) would be greatly appreciated. I'm not sure how much
management of the landscape I need to be doing and I'm interested in
introducing some other wildflowers into this meadow (maybe texas
bluebonnets?) Thanks!   --Kate

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From: [email-masked] (Christine Owens)
Date: 4 Apr 1995 03:26:07 GMT

>bluebonnets?) Thanks!   --Kate

It depends on a) how much work you are willing to do, and b) whether
you want a "managed" meadow, or what grows naturally.  Personally,
I would opt for introducing seed of any flower I wanted and otherwise
leaving the place alone -- less work, more adventure watching it evolve.

Chris Owens

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From: [email-masked] (Christine Owens)
Date: 4 Apr 1995 03:26:07 GMT

Chris Owens

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From: [email-masked] (Christine Owens)
Date: 4 Apr 1995 03:26:07 GMT

Chris Owens