Naomi Slade takes on the pests!
A lack of progress is vexing, but there are still rewards to enjoy
This week I had intended to write a cheerful horticultural tale. You know, something upbeat; a nice floral story with some top tips, befitting of high summer.
But, actually, I’m feeling more introspective than that. My attitude to the garden is flip-flopping backwards and forwards. On the one hand, I’m delighted with the improvements that have been made in just a few short months. The space has been transformed from something tidy but unbearably sterile to something that is chaotic but really quite verdant in places.
At the same time, though, I’m frustrated by the lack of progress; the paths are not paved or formalised yet and my second pond is yet to materialise. The seating areas, likewise. The plants are still short of RHS Chelsea fulsomeness and perfection.
My saintly self, on one shoulder, is reminding me of the benefits of a lifetime of gardening. Experience has proven that results take time, but they do eventually arrive. The enraged toddler on the other shoulder is screaming that she wants flowers, not slugs, and she wants flowers now!
Ah yes, slugs. The problem with encouraging wildlife is that first you have to encourage wildlife food. And urban oases, by their very nature, are attractive to every plant-hungry pest in the neighbourhood. Slugs and snails; greenfly and blackfly; leaf-miner and small, vexatious caterpillars.
The blue tits came by about a month ago to help clear some bugs, but frankly they’re now due another visit. I’ve moved my few ladybird larvae from more established and pest-free areas of the garden to new, aphid-infested planting. They get fat quickly – but any population study will tell you that the curve of increase of predators will lag the initial boom in food species.
At the same time the garden is giving back – I have lavender, a couple of radishes and wild strawberries. The roses are reblooming, while the haze of growth and greenery draws me outside to potter a hundred times a day. This dinky space contains all that is delightful and, simultaneously, all the evils of the world – like Pandora’s horticultural box! But my saintly self is doubtless correct, and all will be well in the end.