Did you know that planting yellow rattle can improve the biodiversity of your mini meadows, by weakening grass and increasing the number of wildflowers that can grow?
On the Verge, are giving away yellow rattle seed to improve meadows and mini-meadows including verges and lawns around Seaford.
You can either plant the seeds in an existing area of grass in the Autumn, or you could join our project to try and grow plug plants over Winter, that can then be planted or shared in the Spring.
You can collect free yellow rattle seeds from us this week – see poster below.
Instructions are included with the seeds – and shown below.
How to grow your Yellow Rattle seed in grass
Yellow Rattle is an annual plant – it flowers, sets seed and then dies in a single year. Getting a population of Yellow Rattle flowering and self seeding in your garden is one of the best ways to establish a meadow – the Yellow Rattle will weaken the grass and allow wildflowers to bloom. We suggest starting off by seeding a small, 1 metre square area which you can keep an eye on – the seeds in this envelope are enough for this. Sow your seeds as soon as possible – the fresher the seeds, the better – and they need one good frost to trigger germination.
· Cut the grass as short as you can – really scalp it!
· Remove the cuttings and use a rake to scarify the soil – ie disturbing and opening up the top layer of the soil
· Scatter the seeds and give the area a soak to make sure the seeds are in good contact with the soil.
· You should expect to see seedlings from April. Look out for their little serrated leaves.
· If the plants don’t germinate in large numbers the first year, be patient as they’ll often surprise you in the second year.
· The plants will start dropping their seeds from June onwards – so don’t cut the grass in your Yellow Rattle area until the seeds are ripe. You can collect and re-sow the seeds, or let them drop to provide new plants the following year.
How to grow Yellow Rattle plug plants
Thank you for offering to try growing Yellow Rattle plug plants – this can be tricky to do – so thank you for accepting the challenge!
Sow your seeds as soon as possible – the fresher the seeds, the better – and they need one good frost to trigger germination.
- Place the yellow rattle seeds alongside some of the grass seed in pots or modules on the top of the soil
- The seeds need to go through a frost, so keep them outside
- Yellow rattle is a parasite of grass – so actually needs the grass in order to grow
- We’ve been told fescue is the best type of grass seed, so this is what we’ve supplied
- You should expect to see seedlings from April. Look out for their little serrated leaves.
Keep in touch
Please let us know how you get on! We want to hear back from you – successes and failures! This will help encourage others to have a go, and also help us give people the best advice on what works (and what doesn’t!)
Please send your photos and results to the website here
