Viewing post #1595446 by SkipNJ

Thanks for the supportive responses! I have a vision and a plan for a few areas, but I'm not sure how it's going to work out in practice. I'm an inexperienced gardener with a small budget and limited time, and all the progress is going to be incremental. The trees and shrubs Im getting will be immature offerings from a land trust, and I dont think they'll look like much for a very long time. I'm hoping to grow some of my own perennials from seed. Pictures are probably going to look a little sad at first.

Lakeside said:My property is already pretty wild, so I'm sort of moving in the opposite direction from where you are. However, I do have a fairly large area that the power company cleared and sprayed, which I'm trying to establish as a low maintenance, wildlife-friendly area. One thing I tried there, without success, was establishing a wildflower meadow. Turns out it's not as easy as it looks

I tried just scattering wildflower seeds over about a 1/4 acre. It looked okay, but sparse, the first spring. Then the grasses grew up and it looked pretty messy. The grasses took over the second year. This was a setback for me but not too big a deal because I live in a rural area without immediate neighbors to deal with. If you're in a residential area, you'll need to keep things somewhat maintained or you could end up with complaints, so a notice from the city that you need to cut things back.

After my initial meadow failure, I noted that there were some plants that had survived in with the grasses. I dug those up (mostly purple coneflowers and black-eyed susans) and concentrated them in one area. Over the past few years I've added more of those and I keep testing other plants to see what does well. When I find something that works, I add more of those to the mix and expand the planted area.

I've found that Rudbeckia "Goldstrum" is very popular with bees, butterflies, and birds; needs very little attention, reseeds, and will eventually spread and take over weedy areas. They work very well for me here in Tennessee. Not sure if they'd do as well in NJ.

I'm also experimenting with conifers in various locations. They're pretty tough and have wildlife benefits. Some spread and provide low maintenance ground cover, others have interesting shapes to provide structure to your garden.

You are on the right track, most sources say it will take 3+ years to establish the meadow and it should be dominated by grass. Some of those slower-to-establish perennials might not show up until years later. The species you have seen are pioneer species that will eventually be overtaken by longer lived species. In Tennessee the woods might start to fill in before you ever get to the point of a mature meadow though. For these reasons, I am leaning toward the woodland garden myself, planting desirable trees and shrubs and controlling weeds.