National meadows day

National Meadows Day is an annual celebration of wildflower meadows across the UK.

National Meadows Day is your chance to celebrate wildflower meadows near you. National Meadows Day 2020 is … Saturday 4th July. Today, we are reminded of the 7.5 million acres of meadows and flower-rich grasslands that have been lost since the 1930s.

When a meadow isn’t a meadow…

A true ‘meadow’ is an area of grass maintained by an annual hay cut. It’s made up of perennial plants – species that grow and flower each year, re-appearing from their underground roots each spring. It includes meadow flowers like:

grasses, such as Crested Dog’s-tail, Sweet Vernal Grass and Yorkshire Fog
types of daisy, including Greater Knapweed, Oxeye Daisy and Cat’s-ear
types of pea and vetch, like Red Clover, Bird’s-foot Trefoil, Bush Vetch and Sainfoin
many others, such as Buttercups, Meadow Crane’s-bill, Lady’s Bedstraw, Cowslipsand Wild Carrot.

But many wildflower seed mixes that claim to be meadows are not meadows at all. Instead, they contain only annual plants – species that germinate, flower, set seed and die in one year. For the display to continue in future years, fresh seed has to germinate each year. These seed mixes include many colourful and familiar cornfield flowers such as:

Poppies
Cornflower
Corncockle
Corn Marigold
Corn Chamomile

A floral display for years to come…

Why does this matter? Well, it matters a lot, because the two have to be cultivated very differently if you want flowers to appear every year:

Cornfield flowers are annuals and the patch of soil where they’re growing has to be cultivated – dug over or rotarvated – every year. If this is not done, they’ll quickly disappear.
A true wildflower meadow of perennial plants, on the other hand, is basically a grassy lawn with lots of flowers. Once you’ve sown the seed in the first year, all you do is mow the meadow in late summer, remove the cuttings, and then leave alone until the following summer.

This essential difference is rarely explained. But, if you sow a mix of cornfield annuals and treat it like a wildflower meadow, it will look spectacular in the first year and rubbish thereafter. Without the annual cultivation of the soil, the flowers won’t germinate and grow. If you’re prepared to dig over the patch of soil each year though, you’ll keep that spectacular display going.

A true wildflower meadow seed-mix will contain just those perennial flowers. The display in the first year might not look great (perennials usually take a few years to get going) but as long as you don’t mow until late summer, it will improve and get more spectacular each year.

For more on how to grow a meadow, see our guide here.

groups involved in national meadows day ….