1. Poor soils are an advantage. On rich, fertile soils, wildflowers are rapidly smothered by strong growing grasses, vigorous plants such as nettle, dock and thistle, and by bramble and scrub. Where conditions are very dry, sandy, rocky or contain a high proportion of industrial wastes, slower growing plants and those adapted to specialised conditions are better able to survive. Fertile soils are well suited to native cornfield annuals, which require annual cultivation.
    On fertile sites, it is possible to strip the topsoil, and either use it elsewhere for nursery production, vegetable growing or other uses, or to sell it. Except for very small areas, a machine will be required for excavation and transport.
    One way to determine the soil fertility of a vegetated site is by looking at the plants growing there. The publication Flowers in the grass, English nature (1992) contains a key to using plants to indicate soil fertility. Expertise in grass identification is needed to use the key, for which the best reference is Grasses, Hubbard C E (1984).
  2. To reduce fertility, mowings should be removed from wildflower grasslands. no fertilisers or organic matter should be used on the site.
  3. Wildflower seed mixes should be sown thinly. This allows individual plants plenty of space to establish, and when they seed, sufficient bare ground for germination. The use of agricultural seed drills encourages optimum germination, so allowing seed to be sown very thinly. Wildflower seed is expensive, so this helps offset the cost compared with conventional grass seed mixes.
  4. Carefully-timed management is needed to allow successful establishment of the sward, and to maintain it from year to year. The management regime must suit the site conditions, the species sown, and the use the area will receive. The regime must be followed every year without fail for best results.
  5. It is usually easier to establish a new, flower-rich habitat, than it is to convert an existing lawn or agricultural grassland into such a habitat.

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