Wind damage to wildflower meadow

Meadowlark

I am new to this forum. Our wild flower meadow is 3 years old and this year has grown very tall. We have a lot of red campion which is flowering and the ox eye daisies and other flowers are about to come out. We have had very high winds and the meadow is bashed about and flattened. Would you advise cutting it - will it recover and reflower this year? Thanks for your help ..

Butterfly66

It may spring back up itself? We have lots of ox-eye daisies and always cut them down after flowering to get a second flowering, can’t advise if the meadow as a whole will. If it looks a mess maybe worth doing anyway as an experiment 

Dovefromabove

Hello @Meadowlark and welcome to the forum

I would leave it ... thinking back to the meadows of my childhood, they often recovered pretty well at this stage ... if they'd already flowered I'd say cut it, leave it to dry and shed their seeds and make hay ... making hay and removing it means that the soil isn't fed by the grasses and therefore remains 'poor' and suitable for the wildflowers ... poor soil means that in future plants shouldn't grow quite so lush and tall, although this year the exceptionally wet May means that many plants are taller than usual.  

Meadowlark

Thank you ...I think we're going to do a bit of both ...so leave some to see if it recovers and then also cut some areas back as an experiment! I think you're right about the wet May having an impact so helpful to be reminded of that. 

Nanny Beach

We gotta have pictures!!

Dovefromabove

Nanny Beach said:

We gotta have pictures!!

@Nannybeach you might be interested to see planting of old cornfield 'weeds' at East Ruston Old Vicarage, on the eastern coast of Norfolk https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-east-ruston-old-vicarage-gardens-norfolk-uk-the-cornfield-is-planted-73441852.html  Click on it and it will enlarge.