How to grow a flower patch from a packet of seed
The easiest thing in the garden, with one catch
A scattered patch of mixed flowers is about the lowest effort thing you can grow, and it's a good way in if a veggie bed feels like too much commitment. There's one thing that decides whether it works though, and it's not the seed you buy or the spot you pick.
It's seed to soil contact. Seed thrown onto hard ground sits on top and dries out between waterings, so mostly it feeds the birds, and that's the whole reason most scattered patches come to nothing. Seed pressed into a scuffed up surface germinates. Everything else about this job is forgiving.
One thing worth being straight about
A packet labelled wildflower or cottage garden is nearly always a mix of introduced annuals rather than Australian natives. Cornflower, cosmos, alyssum, poppy and nasturtium all come from somewhere else, and there's nothing wrong with any of them, but they're not local plants that look after themselves through a dry summer.
That matters because it sets your expectations correctly. These are annuals. They'll give you a long showy season, some of them will drop seed and come back, and they'll want watering through the hot months in a way a genuine native planting wouldn't. If what you actually want is a low water native bed, that's a different job and a different trip to the nursery.
How to sow it
Pick a spot with at least half a day of sun. Most of what's in a mixed packet wants more sun rather than less, and a shaded patch will give you leggy plants reaching for the light with very few flowers on them.
Clear whatever's growing there and scuff the top couple of centimetres up with a rake or a cultivator until it's loose and crumbly. You're not digging a bed, you're just breaking the crust so the seed has somewhere to sit.
Mix your seed with a few handfuls of dry sand or seed raising mix before you scatter it. Fine seed is nearly invisible against soil and you'll put it all in one corner without meaning to, whereas the sand shows you where you've been and spreads it further.
Scatter it, then press it down with the back of the rake. Most flower seed wants to be barely covered, and burying it deep is the other common way to get nothing.
Then keep it damp until it's up. This is the only demanding part and it lasts a couple of weeks. A light watering daily beats a heavy one twice a week, because the top centimetre is where the seed is and that's what dries first.
After it comes up
Thin it if it's ridiculously thick, and otherwise leave it be. Crowding is part of the look and a dense patch shades out most of the weeds that would otherwise come through.
Deadhead if you want it to keep flowering, or let it go to seed at the end if you'd rather it came back on its own. You can't really do both at once, so pick which you're after. Alyssum and cosmos and nasturtium are the ones most likely to self seed and turn up again without you doing anything.
Don't feed it much. A rich soil gives you big leafy plants and fewer flowers, which is the opposite of the point, so this is one bed where being a bit mean pays off.
Shop related products
- D.T. Brown Cottage Garden Mixture. A ready mixed packet and the simplest place to start.
- D.T. Brown Alyssum. Low and sweet smelling, and it self seeds happily.
- D.T. Brown Marigold. Tough and long flowering, and good company for a veggie bed.
- Brunnings Seed Raising Mix 5L. Useful for bulking fine seed out before you scatter it.
Did you know there's a lot more on the seed rack in the garden centre than goes online. Cornflower, cosmos, Californian poppy and Iceland poppy are all in the shop, and so are the single variety packets if you'd rather build your own mix than buy one ready made. Give us a ring on (08) 8536 4333 to check what's there, or browse the D.T. Brown seed range and the wider garden centre range.
Read next
- How to get hoverflies and lacewings into your garden
- Brunnings Seed Raising Mix, and why seeds fail to sprout
- Why potting mix stops soaking up water, and how to fix it
I scatter more seed than any patch needs, every time, on the theory that the birds are getting their cut regardless.
Cheers,
Candeece
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