It’s a wonderful thing to see your plans become reality, isn’t it? Over the last month, with some great help, the meadow has been planted!  Here’s a reminder of the plans, with the layout and the detailed plant list.

My excitement started ramping up when the plants arrived.  I ordered about 400 plants as plugs, from Prairie Moon Nursery. 300 of them came the first week of May, and another installment came the next week.  Despite being closed up in  (vented) boxes for several days, the plants were all in great shape. Then some plants I had germinated myself were ready the first week in June.  In total, we planted 450 small plants. 

One of the trickier bits that they don’t tell you much about is preparing for planting by translating the design on paper to the ground. 

Most professionals ensure their drawing is to scale and on a grid pattern, and then lay out on the ground a corresponding grid of strings, spaced every so many feet apart, to match the scale drawing.  Then they know exactly how to map each square on the drawing to each square on the ground.  I didn’t see the need to be that precise – my meadow is a loose and casual design.  So, I took the drawing, placed a few stakes around to divide the space into the three planting zones, and then drew blobs on the ground using landscape paint to approximate the drawing.

For the first big planting, I was helped by my family, and on a lovely day in early May we planted the first 300 plants, watered them in, and put up a chicken wire fence around the whole thing to keep the rabbits out.  With 4 people planting and one watering as we went, it took about 4 hours.  I was very grateful for the help – it would have taken me at least 4 half-days of work to get these plants in.

The next weekend, my husband and I put in the next 100 plants, and this past weekend I put in the last 50 plants.  In about two weeks I will spread seed for the little bluestem and purple lovegrass, as they need 70-degree temperatures to germinate.

To get established the meadow does need regular care.  There is no in-ground irrigation, so watering is done with an overhead sprinkler, to get at least an inch of water twice a week for now.  I will reduce that to once every 5 days later in June, and to once a week for the rest of the summer.  Next year the meadow will only get supplemental watering in the heat of the summer.

It also needs weeding regularly for the first several years until the space fills in enough to crowd out the weeds.  I have weeded twice now and will weed about monthly for the rest of the year. While some weeds are innocuous, others are very aggressive and it’s important to keep those out of the meadow, and it’s easiest now when they are still small.  This means I have to study a bit, so I recognize the seedling meadow plants and leave them alone when weeding!

It will take probably 3 years for the meadow to look like a meadow, and it will be fun to watch and take care of.  I’ll let you know when I see the first pollinators!