Ground preparation - manual style!
October was a month of ground preparation for sowing more wildflower seeds. We don't have any tractor equipment so this has to be done by hand.
In the lower haymeadow, using a domestic push mower, we cut several small strips, about 12 foot x 6 foot in size, as short as we could. It took around six passes of the mower to get a really tight cut with some bare soil showing (I was somewhat grateful our local farmer neighbours did not drive by while Simon was pushing the lawnmower around the field).
After raking off successive layers of grass clippings and removing these to the edge of the field, we then scarified the ground further with rakes and metal scrapers. The aim was to get around 50 percent of the strip down to bare soil and it is pretty hard manual labour! Having glibly ordered a kilo of Yellow Rattle seed from Forestart (Shrewsbury) via our local Marches Meadow Group, we realised, once the bag arrived, we had rather a lot to sow!
The seed was sown by hand directly on to the soil and gently trampled in. We decided to experiment and left two half strips and one whole strip empty to start, and these were later sown with seed we had refrigerated and/or put in the freezer for 5 days. (Yellow Rattle requires some frosts to germinate). We have done a sketch plan of the strips and will monitor how they grow next year. Not very scientific, but an interesting exercise.
... and yet more soil scarifying
In the fenced off wetland strip there is an area of dry grassy bank we would like to manage for the wildflowers that grow there. We tried turning 30 lambs in there to take the long grass off in October, but they were not impressed with being cooped up in the small plot after having six acres to roam in, so they were let out once more lest they made a break for it. They had started to do a good job though.
So we set to doing some manual grass removal with hand sickles, in six foot wide 'crescents'. The point of this (as with the grass strips above) is to remove the long grass and thatch and create some bare soil to mimic grazing and trampling by animals - to give wildflowers room to come up. We sowed Yellow Rattle into the plots and some other wildflower seed we had gathered by hand, including Betony, St John's Wort, Sheeps Bit, Knapweed, Musk Mallow, Pignut &c. Hopefully in future years the grass growth will be less vigorous here, allowing the flowers to come through but we will probably have to keep managing these areas into the future in some shape or form. We removed the grass/hay clippings to the fenceline.
A Surprise in the Soil?
We had always assumed the pH of soil in the field was acid or slightly acid. But in October we did some soil testing in the bottom half of the field, on the tumps and in the wetland strip - and were surprised to find it is neutral to alkaline (slightly less alkaline in the wetland area, but not much). Since many farmers around here lime their fields occasionally, this was a surprise. I have read in some obscure research paper that Yellow Meadow Ants (Lasius Flavus) can change the pH of the soil around them towards the alkaline - and flowers like Birds Foot Trefoil and Ladys Bedstraw which grow in large numbers on the tumps are neutral to alkaline loving plants. More research needed!
Wetland development
The new wetland area is now 4 months old and the starkness of July when the diggers left the site flattened, brown and bare has softened and re-greened considerably since.
The newly-opened water channel, pools and side pools are slowly coming alive with aquatic insect life and water-loving plants are spreading up from the main pool including wild Watercress, Water Starwort and Round-Leaved Crowfoot. I gathered seeds from Meadowsweet and Figwort within 100 yards of the house and sowed them into bare soil on the channel banks along with Ragged Robin seeds. One or two Wrens seem to spend quite a bit of time amongst the rushes and Snipe (well, we sure they are Snipe) have been seen several times rising up in jagged flight from wet ground in the early mornings. And we have frequent Herons now, shyly stalking the ponds in their grey shawls.
Wet woodland planting
Covid19 allowing, the wetland site will be planted up with wet woodland trees - a mix of Alder, Grey Willow and Downy Birch in early December. More about this next time.
Finally, hedge laying, Shropshire-style
Bob James, local farmer and skilled hedge-layer has been on site for the past few days laying a length of our field hedge. It has not been laid for around 12-15 years and was really in need of some thickening up and reviving. It's made up of Elder and Hawthorn. Elder isn't the easiest to work with since it can be brittle. The hedge is fenced on the other side to protect it from grazing sheep.
Bob is doing the work in aid of the local Redlake Valley Community Benefit Society who have bought and now manage two quillets (strips of woodland) in Brineddin Wood in Chapel Lawn a mile away. I designed a poster for him (below) using a photo I took of him laying our hedge. If you are within a reasonable radius of Chapel Lawn (SY7) and are interested in having your hedge laid this winter, get in touch with him - very reasonable rates and extremely reliable and skilled.
thanks, that was helpful! After 11 years living here I'm reclaiming a .5 acre field from the ponies and unfilling the filled in wet bit (locals tell me "pond" would be too strong a word) and doing as much rewilding as poss. I bought some yellow rattle and wildflower seed last year and scattered liberally and saw i cornflower! I will try and get out and copy your grass removing method and see how I get on. I know the soil will be rather rich for wildflowers, it's had ponies on it for the last 3 decades, but we'll see what we can do