As soon as I got to my seat in the office I could see there had been a big change outside - all the wildflowers have been cutback as it's the end of the season.
The National Wildflower Centre looks very different now the visitor season is over - photo by Susan Humphreys
I spoke to Peter Frances, nursery assistant at the National Wildflower Centre, about the reasons why the wildflowers are cut back now.
He said: “The first reason is for appearance, and the second is that anything flowers and seeds has dropped its seeds now so it’s ok to cut it. We stack it in small haystacks and occasionally we get hedgehogs going into them it provides a home for them over the winter. If we take the stacks away to soon the insects on the plants haven’t chance to get away and move somewhere else, so they’re left for a few weeks.”
There has been loads of ladybirds this year and Peter says it’s been a good year for butterflies especially Painted Ladies, in fact he saw one just yesterday which is quite late on. There have also been lots of common blue butterflies and six spotted burnet moths.
The wildflowers are cut using a scythe mower and piled into mini-'haystacks' - photo by Susan Humphreys
I then asked Peter what they use to cut the wildflowers.
He said: “We use a scythe mower rather than a lawn mower, it’s like a hedge-trimmer on wheels, the blades work the same way, and it’s quicker than a strimmer. The stacks will rot down into compost and by cutting back it gives us chance to see where a species is dominating and then we can thin it out.”
There are lots of different wildflowers, cowslips, birdsfoot trefoil, kidney vetch, vipers bugloss, wild carrot, lesser knapweed and some wild marjoram.
Peter said: “There are poppies too but they’re not guaranteed to come back each year, the seeds are there but they haven’t germinated and the vipers has taken over, so it might be a case of moving the poppies. If the soil is disturbed though the poppies may come back again where they’ve been struggling. The wild basil has been fading too.”
There are also teasels left around the edges, which the goldfinches like to feed on. A flock of ten-12 is a regular sight coming over the building and the staff put out feeders too.
The wildflowers tend to start to come back in late February, when everything suddenly greens up.
I have also been introduced to two new faces at the National Wildflower Centre - two furry faces! Teasel and Sally Stray the cats.
Teasel the cat likes to hang out in the polytunnels or on the compost! Photo by Susan Humphreys
Sally Stray likes fussing and food - photo by Susan Humphreys
I also got to see the pumpkins that are growing behind the scenes and that are destined for the Cornflower Cafe - I suspect around Halloween!
Alison also tells me that they believe there's a fox living on the site too - I hope I spot it but I think I'd have to be here very early!
I've had my lunch in the cafe again - a very delicious mixed bean chilli - and noticed that you can now buy some items from the shop (which is closed until the new season) in there too. There are some books, bookmarks, trolley tokens, cards and eco pens and a few other items.
There was also a poster up advertising a coffee morning for Macmillan Cancer Support on Friday September 25th 2009, 10.30-noon. It's for a really good cause so come along if you can, and we'd also really appreciate any prize donations for the raffle.
Last week there was no blog as I went along to a Mersey Partnership tourism meeting. It was really interesting to hear some of the events being planned across Merseyside including the Picasso exhibition at the Tate and Go Penguins!
We'd love to have a penguin at the National Wildflower Centre if anyone fancies sponsoring one for us!!
We've also had a meeting discussing ideas for next year's Green Fayre and the Knowsley Flower Show - and there was some very exciting themes being suggested, but of course we have the Winter Celebration first, but I'll save that for another time.
See you soon
Susan
0 comments:
Post a Comment