19 Essential 2024 Product Guide Establishment Wildflowers all germinate and establish at different rates. Some species may take a number of years until they emerge and begin to flower, whereas others flower in a matter of weeks. Some seeds require a prolonged period of exposure to cold in order to break their dormancy and germinate. Seed dormancy is a mechanism that inhibits germination until the conditions are ideal for successful establishment. Annual wildflower species when sown in the Spring will flower in the same year. Biennial and Perennial species will not flower in the first year of sowing except for a handful of species such as Oxeye Daisy and White Campion. For this reason it is often a popular choice to add some annuals into a perennial mixture when sowing in the Spring. When sowing a mixture containing grasses, it will be the grass species which germinate and establish first. This will act as a ‘nurse crop’ for the wildflowers, sheltering them whilst they establish as well as preventing soil erosion by stabilising the soil. The grasses selected to go into our mixtures have been deliberately chosen to be non-competitive, slower growing species. Grass dominance is a common reason why wildflower sowings sometimes fail, so by including only slow growing species this is minimised.
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