Ever since I moved here to this tiny bay on Galway’s ‘Wild Atlantic Way’ I have been constantly surprised by the amount and variety of wildflowers growing in and around the surrounding countryside.
Some of them are truly stunning and until I moved here most of them were not familiar to me at all, not that I am an expert.
I’m just someone who loves gardening and walking and is lucky enough to see many beautiful wildflowers almost every time I go out.
THE BURREN
This part of Galway overlaps with the beautiful county Clare and we are quite close to the Burren and so share its rocky landscape.
This means we also share many of its wildflowers and plants.
The Burren is known for its beautiful wild orchids and they are surprisingly common. We also have some growing in our garden.
I consider it a privilege to have them and plan to keep their area as safe as I can.
I love wild flowers so when we moved here I planned to grow a wild flower meadow.
Sadly it didn’t grow and since then the meadow has returned to its grassy/weedy state.
It was very disappointing at the time but a couple of years later I am a little more philosophical and am learning that all gardening is an experiment.
Instead of one large wild flower meadow I decided instead to create small round gardens, working from the house outwards.
That way we are breaking down the task into smaller chunks as well as endeavoring to incorporate some of the principles of permaculture.
PROTECTING WILDFLOWERS
I am determined to keep the garden as natural as possible. I also want to protect the lovely plants and flowers by reserving a special place for them to do their own thing.
For this purpose we have decided to leave half of our garden to it’s own device – with just a little help from me.
We call this area ‘the wild’ – what else could we call it?
At the moment the wild part of the garden is home to a growing number of cowslips.
With their soft green leaves and gently bowing heads they really are pretty and I am delighted to see them arriving in the garden as prior to this year the cowslip has been quite rare in my garden.
I also have the following flowers and you can read about them by clicking on the links below.
Scabiosa or Devils Bit
Ragwort or Stinking Willie
Wild Teasel
Cowslips
As time goes on I will be adding more wildflowers here on the site and hope you enjoy them as much as I do.
As I said, I am not a plant or wildflower expert so if you are, or if you have any more information, or even stories, myths and legends about wildflowers then I would love to hear from you.
Have fun in your garden.
Grace
P.S. If you enjoy this site please like and share – spread the joy of gardening.
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