Wildflower Turf and Green Roofs Blog

Garden designer Clare Fullerton of New Leaf Garden Design, has kindly sent us some photos of a project she completed in an urban London garden. Artichoke Landscapes installed 25m² of Wildflower Turf, which has made a substantial difference to what was a sparse and monoculture environment.

An environment which once had a very low diversity, has now benefited from a wildflower meadow. The meadow has created a naturally bio-diverse habitat, and as you can see from the pictures, the Wildflower Turf  has been successfully incorporated with other plant species, as well as a lawn, to create a natural and tranquil planting scheme.

Thanks to Clare for providing us with these images.

Tim Morris Building Consultancy and Design have successfully installed our Wildflower Roof Turf at Black Pasture Cottage. Matthew Timms, director of Tim Morris, has kindly sent us some images of this project for our records.

As the images below show, the green roof seamlessly merges into the raised area, providing one continuing landscape of wildflowers.

Matthew Timms commented, “the building works are not entirely complete but it shows the new turf you supplied which has taken extremely well.”

We are grateful to Tim for the positive feedback and have asked for more pictures next summer!

With outdoor space being a premium and in some cases a luxury, it is no surprise that we feel compelled to pack extra value from every square metre of land by erecting sheds for extra storage, laying patios for outdoor dining and block paving our driveways, and in many cases at the expense of the planting.

An example of totally paved front gardens taken from the RHS sustainable gardening pdf

With garden centres, DIY chains and supermarkets pushing hard landscaping, because quite simply, that’s where the money is, it is easy to overlook the soft landscaping option. The thought of having mixed borders in the front garden, showing an array of colour, gently spilling onto the path or driveway is very alluring to most people, but it also spells high maintenance, which doesn’t necessarily fit in with everyone’s busy lifestyle.

What is interesting is that hard surfaces can have a surprising impact on the wider environment. Predominantly, it is the role hard surfaces play in causing environmental problems that are the concern, with some of these problems being cumulative, therefore becoming more noticeable in the future. Some of these are listed below:

• Flooding -  this is the most significant problem. Potentially this can lead to flooding of homes, because hard landscaping can increase the amount of rainwater that runs off by as much as 50%.  Street drains can’t always cope with the extra demand during a storm and can lead to damage and high repair costs.
• Pollution – most UK cities rainwater run-off, gets contaminated and polluted as it is channelled into storm drains and ultimately rivers. In some situations the excess rain water goes directly into the sewerage system. If the system gets overwhelmed with the volume of water, it gets disposed of into rivers. An example of this resulted in 100,000 fish being killed in the River Thames back
  in 2004.
• Dust particles – Grass verges and trees absorb dust particles. Without them dust absorption is greatly reduced. Additionally there is nowhere for birds to nest or for insects to feed.
• Aesthetical impact – endless block paving does not have the interest that soft green landscaping provides.
• Biodiversity - hard landscaping reduces biodiversity within the area.

• Local temperatures – hard surfaces absorb heat in the day and release it at night, referred to as the ‘heat island effect.’ It can also be responsible for poorer air quality and localised weather conditions, such as thunderstorms.
• House prices – if a large proportion of home owners pave their front gardens, then the average house price can drop.
• Structural damage – hard landscaping can potentially reduce or even stop rainfall getting into the ground, which can cause the soil to shrink. Clay soils are particularly vulnerable, which has consequences for structures built on it. As a result garden walls, paths and houses may develop severe cracks or develop severe subsidence.
  Reference: RHS ‘Front gardens Campaign.’

How to make a difference?
It is perfectly understandable for anyone to wish to convert their front garden into a practical, useable space, however it need not be one hundred percent hard landscaping.  A low maintenance approach to the planting is an option.

Installing a wildflower meadow on your roof will greatly enhance biodiversity

Try and maximise the potential for creating green space to encourage wildlife. For example smother walls and fences with climbers to make suitable habitats for nesting birds,  install green roofs on sheds and garages, plus, you could also consider incorporating a wildflower meadow around the perimeter of the paved areas. If it’s a large area, how about breaking it up with strips of wildflower meadow as well? If you are hoping for an instant effect, with minimal effort, then the wildflower option would definitely be worth considering.

A wildflower meadow will add colour and interest to a hard landscaped area, as well as help to absorb rainwater

If you are thinking of employing a garden designer, request in your brief that you want to keep as much green space as possible, with the design being practical enough to allow cars to park within the area. Have a look at this link for further information and some inspiration for front gardens, rhssustainable-gardening. The pdf link is on the top right hand side of the page titled ‘Front gardens Campaign.’

With just a little bit of imagination you could create a really striking and unusual front garden…with emphasis on the word garden!

“Operation Pollinator is an international 5 year biodiversity program to boost the number of pollinating insects on commercial farms, by creating specific habitats, tailored to local conditions and native insects.”
Please follow this link to visit their website: Operation Pollinator

As I am sure you are aware pollinating insects are crucial for the success of many natural habitats. We also rely on pollinating insects for the production of many food crops.
In fact, as much as 80% of European crop types are directly dependent upon insects for their pollination. The link below is a two page pdf which provides more information on
the project.

http://www.operationpollinator.com/resources/documents/Operation%20pollinator%204pger_25%2006%2009.pdf

Come and see the show…our managing director James is exhibiting at the Creating Landscapes show, which is taking place at Capel Manor College, Enfield on the 25th  & 26th October 2011. James will be presenting a seminar at 12pm, Tuesday 25th entitled – “Establishing wildflower meadows – turf or seed?”

We are proud of our products at Wildflower Turf Limited...come as see for yourself at stand 302

You can find us at stand 302…where there will be various samples of our turf on display, as well as something a bit different…it’s got everyone here at Wildflower Turf Limited buzzing with anticipation!

In addition to the seminar with support from Operation Pollinator, we will be sharing our stand with 50 Buff-tailed Bumblebees (Bombus terrestris audax). They will be carefully housed in a see-through bee box, and will have access to a small patch of Wildflower Turf in bloom. The idea is to give people an up close and personal opportunity, to witness the bees gathering nectar, and going about their daily routine.

We are just gearing up to do a spot of filming at our farm, which we will be available through our news letter as well as on our website. We are interested to see how much activity can be found in a wildflower meadow, especially this late in the season. We couldn’t help but notice that there is still a lot of activity, especially with regard to the bees.

Setting up the camera in a good position to film...which was not difficult as the turf was simply buzzing with life!

We were also taking photographs of any invertebrate life we could find on one of our Wildflower beds, and here are a few images of what we found so far…

A striking copper colour fly...anyone know what species of fly this is?

Bee utilising the knapweed for nectar

This little beetle seemed to be in no hurry

A tiny spider takes cover under the knapweed

Keep an eye out on our website for our video footage, which will illustrate some of the wildlife that can be found within Wildflower Turf…