Organic Site Preparation for Wildflower Establishment

Site preparation is one of the most important and often inadequately addressed components for successfully installing pollinator habitat. These guidelines provide step-by-step instructions, helpful suggestions, and regional timelines & checklists for preparing both small and large sites using:

  • Solarization
  • Smother cropping
  • Repeated shallow cultivation
  • Sheet mulching
  • Soil inversion
  • Organic herbicide applications
  • Sod removal

Use this document with the timeline(s) & checklist(s) applicable to your region, available at right.

Organic Site Preparation Methods: A Comparative Overview provides a brief overview of these site preparation methods and is intended to help you quickly assess the suitability of each method for a given site.

Click here to see the full list of region-and state-specific Habitat Installation Guides.

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