In an effort to develop my newly aquired garden as inexpensively and sustainably as possible, I am raising as many plants as I can from seed. Among the perennials I sowed last year – echinaceas, salvias, sea holly, calamint – I include a few wildflowers whose seed I had collected from local hedgerows: field scabious, teasel, white campion, wild carrot. These plants produced blooms this summer that were attractive and magnets for pollinators, including species of bee, beetle and hoverfly. No single action in the garden has felt as deeply rewarding.
Amid an intensifying biodiversity crisis in which insect species are in significant decline, it is heartening to see a growing appreciation for weeds and wildflowers – plants that pollinators rely on for forage and habitat. Many gardeners are now loosening tidiness, abandoning destructive pesticides and welcoming interlopers.
