Johnstown Sunflower Trail 2022

June

• Planting out by groups

July to September

• Johnstown Sunflower Trail begins.

October

• Harvest seeds for next year.

• Create natural bird feeders.

November

• Composting plants and clearing sites.

The iconic sunflower catches everyone's attention and our 2021 display trail highlighted the lack of other colourful flowers in public spaces. Our social media posts proved to be one of the most popular and they gained the attention of the Meath Chronicle newspaper for an article about us.

The sunflower is the national flower of Ukraine and, through the project, we aim to raise funds for one of the key charities supporting the people displaced by the war.

Sunflowers were chosen because of their large noticeable iconic shape, they are easy to grow, and they easily bring a smile to people of all ages. They can provide a neighbourhood theme and, being of great benefit to wildlife, they work towards creating connected bee corridors.

Building on the success, and learnings, of the 2021 trail we were able to approach more new sites with easterly and southerly facing locations, all in prominent locations close to footpaths and where nearby businesses or residents would help to plant and water the flowers. 58 sites were selected. 

Staff and students at our 4 nearest schools, St Stephen's National School, Colaiste na Mi Secondary School, St Mary's Special School and Ard Ri Community National School, were approached and they welcomed the opportunity to be involved in germinating and growing hundreds of seeds until ready for planting.

We have planned to have a huge surplus with the intention of giving flowers to households along the route to grow in their own front gardens.

We have created a street poster with QR codes to direct interested members of the public to our website for more information.

We will encourage trail followers to photograph and record any wildlife or insects seen feeding on the plants.

Following mainly public roads and paths the looped +10km trail is part of our Healthy Living Plan to encourage and promote walking and cycling. In the Summer we plan to team up with the Navan Cycling Initiative group to further promote this. 

The trail includes the Navan IDA park which does close its northern, Bothar Sion, gates on weekends but despite this the area is still accessed by walkers and cyclists. The Johnstown School Campus is also included and although not accessible to the general public it is still accessed by over 1,500 students and their parents too.

• Sunflowers grow well in Ireland to provide food for pollinators and seeds for wild birds and future planting. 

• Seedlings this year will be grown directly in compost bags and later transferred into their planting position. This removes the need to use any other planting pots and the compost bags can be recycled.

• Watering funnels, made from collected and recycled plastic bottles, improve water conservation by efficiently watering the plant roots directly. These pipes will later be cleaned and recycled.

• Some seed heads will be harvested for next year's flowers but most will be left in place. We noticed that last year birds naturally found the seeds when left on the plant but a minority of seed heads will be cut and hung from tree branches as natural bird feeding stations in more suitable locations.

• The spent plant will be shredded and then composted at our Walterstown GFC site.

• Bamboo support canes are being reused from last year but the vast majority of plants will not need any support.

• Overview of the year: April germination, Late June planting out, July - October flowering, and removal from mid October to late November.

• We successfully engaged over 200 people in producing a complete trail that was again well received by the community, the bees, hoverflies, and later in the season the wild birds too.

• Gaining a sponsor to provide 40 compost bags was invaluable and helped extend the trail to 50 sites. The sponsor has been retained for 2023 with a commitment to provide compost, pots, and supplies.

• The seed germination by the 4 local schools was very successful. Germination and growth at Ard Ri was outstanding where the warm tarmac floor encouraged growth in the sunny wind-sheltered position. The semi-shaded area at St Stephen's produced a good crop, despite an excellent initial germination and growth the grassy areas at both CnaMi and St Mary's Special School suffered from severe slug attacks. The loss of more than 1/3 of the crop overnight from slugs impacted the planned display and prevented the donation of sunflowers for residents' gardens. Alternative growing locations need to be found.

• Germinating the sunflower seeds directly in grow bags was considerably more successful than the paper pots of 2021. 40 planted per bag was reasonably easy to transport and the plastic liner helped water retention.

• Very few species required support poles and of which only a small number were taken.

• The purchase of 200ltr flat pack portable plastic watering containers proved very successful and we were able to utilise harvested rainwater for those not being watered by resident groups.

• Of the +50 sites proposed, 40 were planted, 27 create very successful displays and the remainder requires revision to be more successful next year. 

• Not all the sunflowers bloomed at the same time, the multiheaded species on roundabouts worked well and extended their display time. Perhaps a mix should be used at other sites to extend their interest over a longer time.

• Planting in pots at Spireview Lawn, which suffered from slugs in 2021, was very successful. In future pots need to be secured to the floor to prevent wind damage. More sites are planned with pots donated by the sponsor.

• Only a few seedheads were hung as natural birdfeeders since many of the heads suffered from mould.

• Many of the sunflower roots were left in the ground to return nitrogen to the soil whilst the stems, being slow to compost, were sent to Navan Recycling Centre for industrial composting.

• Street signage with QR codes on simple plaques proved to be successful although we need to use our own stakes to reduce the number taken down.

• Extending the display into the IDA using last year's images gained us an introduction to 6 IDA  businesses and 8 display sites. 6/8 of the display sites were very successful, only 2 sites were lacking due to insufficient watering.

• We missed out on engaging more with secondary schools who break for summer in late May but we should engage primary schools prior to May for a 2023 colouring competition to help create display posters to promote the project.