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Gardening

Prairie planting

(5 Posts)
whitewave Wed 06-Jul-16 22:04:10

After my rambling rose collapse I now have a sunny bed rather than shade.

Anyone planted a prairie scheme if so what % grass to flowers. Any recommendations? Thank you.

merlotgran Wed 06-Jul-16 22:20:32

I have a large prairie type border, whitewave. Not sure of the actual % of grass to flowers but there's definitely more flowers.

Piet Oudolf has created some stunning praire gardens and his books and YouTube vids are well worth a look for inspiration.

I have planted Eupatorium, Calamagrostis, Helenium, Echinacea, lots of Achilleas, Miscanthus and Deschampsia.

I'm always adding to it because space is not an issue. I can recommend Eupatorium because it doesn't need staking, spreads quickly and props up other plants.

Smaller ornamental grasses can go at the front.

whitewave Thu 07-Jul-16 07:24:42

Just seen your reply merlot thank you. I will look on you tube and made a note of your recommendations. Must prepare the ground now.

TriciaF Thu 07-Jul-16 21:16:50

Here you can buy packets of mixed seeds for a prairie garden, 3 or 4 different types of mixtures. We were going to seed part of ours for that, but then realised it would have to be all dug over, cleared of weeds, raked etc.
Too much heavy work for us, we have a lot of very rough land.
But good luck, whitewave hope you manage it.

Jalima Thu 07-Jul-16 21:31:04

It sounds lovely!

I have only just caught up with the idea of leaving a bit of lawn for a flower meadow ....
can't keep up grin

The only bed I could use (an overgrown herbaceous border) probably doesn't get enough sun.