Bracknell prairie - September to November

10 comments

The last blog left the prairie at the end of August

By mid September, new colours are appearing, notably from solidago rugosa (which has not remained upright as I had hoped), and aster amellus ‘Veilchenkonigin’. The knautia is still in flower after three months as a result of being deadheaded every few days (which is cheating as the whole ethos of prairie planting is not to deadhead) as well a white form of our native field scaious, knautia arvensis. The grasses are coming to the fore now, and colchicum autumnale, already in this bed, is making an appearance

At the end of the month, the asters are in bloom (there are some short ones on the far side of the bed). The tall mauve one is self sown but I may replace it with a better coloured one. Acanthus sennii with red flowers and colchicum ‘Waterlily’ were already in the bed. I have had to support the tall solidago so it may need to be replaced by a shorter, self-supporting variety

The colour is starting to fade as October starts to gather pace, but the nerines are just opening beside the drive

By the end of the month, the grasses are becoming the dominant plants and autumn tints are starting to creep in. There are one or two gaps showing where additional plants can be added for next year

We are now into mid November, practically all colour has gone, and the grasses are standing out. But I think I need a lot more of them to get the full prairie effect

Finally, by the end of the month, we are left almost exclusively with browns and greys. Now, the seedheads of pennisetum alopeculoides ‘Hameln’ really stand out against the rest of the plants

For its first year, I am more than happy with the way this has turned out. I have put in lots of bulbs for next spring, and this series of photos will help me to tweak the planting for subsequent years. The whole bed will be cut down in January and will start all over again.

• 30 Nov, 2019
• 10 likes

More blog posts by AndrewR