Making Seed Bombs for Earth Day

Here’s an easy craft that not only adds some beauty and pop of color to neglected areas of your yard, but also helps attract pollinators to your community. Seed bombs are an easy and relatively inexpensive way to spread native wildflowers.

Traditionally, powdered clay, soil and native wildflower seeds are all you need to make seed bombs. But, if you’re missing an ingredient, you can also make seed bombs with construction paper, a little bit of water and wildflower seeds. The clay and paper help to keep the birds from eating the seeds. Choosing seeds that are native to where you live is also important. Wildflowers like Black Eyed Susans, Purple Coneflower, Joe Pye Weed or Aster would be good choices if you’re planning to grow flowers in a sunny area. If it’s a little more shaded, Cardinal Flower, Wild Ginger and Solomons Seal would be good choices for the Charlotte region.

If you’re going the paper route on making your seed bombs, you’ll need to cut the paper into 1 inch squares and soak in water. At a minimum soak the paper squares for 15-20 minutes. Next you’ll want to make a pulp. Squeeze out the excess water from the paper and pulse in the food processer until it becomes more of a pastelike consistency.

From there, you will move your paper mixture to a bowl and gently mix in the wildflower seeds. If you’re using clay and soil just add water and mix until you get a dough like consistency before adding in the wildflower seeds.

Next form the mixture into a ball or use a silicon mold to form into shapes. Let the seed balls dry for 24-48 hours. Toss the seed balls where you want the flowers to grow, or bury them about 1/4″ deep into the soil. Make sure to add plenty of water.