WILDFLOWER MEADOW AND OTHER DREAMS
The first thing I planned to do when I moved to our new home in Galway was to grow a wildflower meadow.
The section directly in front of the house, which faces east, was an unruly grass-covered mess that apparently used to be a lawn.
My husband, M, is not keen on gardening at all, although he doesn’t mind helping out now and again, so the plan was to employ somebody to tame that part of the garden.
BURREN-ESQUE
We are situated just on the edge of the Burren so share its landscape. This means we have more rocks than you could imagine and very little soil.
Still we hoped to get the ground nice and even, de-rock it, get it level, get rid of the scutch grass etc. and plant the wildflower seeds in time to have a lovely, fragrant flower-covered meadow by June.
How I dreamed of this – especially when confined to a downstairs room looking out over a gloomy winter field when I was recovering from my accident.
You see, neither of us ever wanted to spend Sunday afternoons pushing a lawnmower up and down, never, ever!
We heard that a wildflower meadow would have only need to be strimmed a couple of times a year.
We also thought it would be lovely to look out and see flowers from the front of the house.
PASSIONATE GERRY
We duly found a gardener, Gerry, who claimed to be passionate about gardening.
Now at first, Gerry worked hard, clearing stones, killing weeds etc.
He came regularly, a couple of days a week until about March, when he started making arrangements but then not turning up. He didn’t bother ringing to let me know either.
When this happened several times I pulled him up on it and he apologized but blamed it on a host of various problems.
I didn’t say that even with my smashed up leg I would have managed a quick call to let someone know if I wasn’t coming to work.
Why? Well, because at that stage I was anxious to get my wildflower meadow finished before it was too late to sow the seeds and despite his bout of unreliability I still had faith in his ‘passion’ for gardening.
WILD RESULTS
Anyway, eventually he did turn up and he ‘finished’ the job in early April. All the wildflower seeds were planted and he assured me that in a few short weeks I would start to see some results.
Well… for the last few weeks I have been seeing results, grass, scutch grass, weeds and up to today the 7th June 2013 – there have been no wildflowers.
Apart from these beautiful cowslips but then these were already there…
I have emailed Gerry but he hasn’t replied so far, and I’m not holding my breath.
However, I am hoping there will be a remedy for the flowerlessness you see below and that it’s not too late to salvage something.
I am longing for something pretty and flowerful and hopefully something that doesn’t look like this:
I will keep you posted. Oh and if anyone has any advice or comments, you are welcome to post here
Back soon,
Grace
P.S. Here’s what Gerry said when I managed to speak to him about my wild flowerless meadow.
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