Gardening
The birds & the bees!
Awildlife garden doesn’t have to be a jungle. It can be well-kept and still be an abundant habitat. My garden is a mass of bees and butterflies, encouraged by planting the right kind of flowers. There are moths that feed on night-scented plants, their caterpillars providing food for many species of birds. It feels vital and alive, yet tidy and good to look at, and brings me much joy.
Insects provide food for birds, bats and mammals so they are an important part of the food chain. Most of the flowers I grow have easily accessible flowers. I avoid highly bred flowers, choosing for example single, openflowered dahlias over double varieties. A study by the University of Sussex revealed some of the top plants for insects: lavender, marjoram, everlasting wallflower
“Bowles’ Mauve” and lambs’ ears. The least attractive to them were pelargoniums, commonly known as geraniums.
In my garden, other top bee plants are catmint, Michaelmas daisies, poppies, sea holly, alliums, candytuft and echinacea. They all give me a mass of colour, so a wildlife garden can also be colourful. Both native and exotic plants can be sources of nectar and pollen. Dahlias are from Mexico, lavender from the Mediterranean, but I mix them with British wildflowers such as wild carrot and vipers’ bugloss, a magnet for bumble bees.
Insects are especially helpful in the veg garden. They pollinate vegetables and control pests, making them friends and allies in our chemical-free garden. Hoverfly larvae eat aphids, but the adults need a meal of pollen before they lay their eggs, so we plant marigolds alongside the veg for them to feed on. Hoverflies are so pretty with their striped bodies and restless darting about. My favourite is the marmalade hoverfly! I grow flowers that give a succession of nectar from late winter to late autumn. This starts with heathers, hellebores and crocuses, continues with lungworts, cowslips and wallflowers, is dominated by herbs in summer, and culminates in sedums in autumn. Just one clump of sedum will be covered in bumble bees and butterflies, a spectacular finale to the year!