Poets’ muse is on the margins
No self-respecting nightingale would tarnish its golden-voiced reputation by bursting into song amid the hustle and bustle of busy London streets.
Lyricists may have immortalised such things in a famous wartime ballad, but the last time these avian minstrels performed in the capital was an age before grand houses came to Berkeley Square.
Traditionally, nightingales have been hailed as shy denizens of deep, dark woodlands, with their elusiveness glorified in the metaphysical stanzas of some of our greatest poets.
John Keats’ ode eulogises the “lightwinged Dryad of the trees” while John Clare, in The Nightingale’s Nest, sets his encounters in “green woodland-rides with listening leaves”.
The clandestine life of the heard-butrarely-seen nightingale came home to roost while reading the broad-leaved woodland chapter of the Reader’s Digest Book of Birds as a teenager. For every 10 people who hear nightingales pouring out their spring arias, only one sets eyes on the bird in its subdued shades of brown, the book revealed.
Since the 1960s, encounters in forest glades have become increasingly rare. Over the past 25 years, nightingale numbers have declined by 48% and fewer than 6,000 singing males make it to our shores from Africa each spring.
What’s more, the likelihood of hearing one in a typical English forest with native trees and lush green canopy is nigh impossible. Nightingales have been driven from their woodland realm by avaricious deer grazing on the tangled understorey where they nest.
The corollary of a rapidly rising deer population, particularly non-native muntjac, has seen the ‘migration’ of nightingales to the scrubby margins of old quarries.
Out celebrating Dawn Chorus Day recently brought home this remarkable shift in habitat choice. Alongside a railway track skirting a former claypit, now home to a huge incinerator plant and in the shadow of a towering wind turbine, three male nightingales formed a remarkable trio as they claimed territories in the dense tangles of hawthorn and dogwood with their 95-decibel songs.
One ponders what Keats would have thought.
Due to deer grazing they are now driven to scrubby old quarries
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evergreen climbers. If you’re in Italy on your holidays this summer you will be sure to spot it as it is commonly used on garden railings and up walls.
But if you don’t get away, the heady scent of the starry white flowers on a warm evening will transport you anyway. It does prefer a warm sunny spot for the best performance and this year there’s a new variety called ‘Star of Milano’ which has a subtle gold variegation on the leaf margin and pink flushed blooms.
Growing to three metres in height it requires no pruning and will fit in a modern garden.
The new Philadelphus ‘Petite Perfume White’ will also produce a wonderfully strong fragrance. It’s a compact variety so perfect for container growing on patios, small courtyards or a balcony.
Philadelphus, the orange blossom, is an undemanding shrub that will grow well in most soils in sun or some partial shade.
Salvias are good performers in the herbaceous borders or pots for summer as they are long flowering, have aromatic foliage and will attract pollinators to your plot.
‘Belle de Loire’ is a new French variety with flowers that emerge orange and yellow in late spring and mellow to a soft cream and salmon colour over the summer.
Salvia or ornamental sage are good contenders for dry gravelly plots as they develop drought resistance as they establish.
Petunias along with begonias and geraniums are the mainstays of most hanging baskets and container arrangements.
Petunia ‘Nicola’ is a new Tumbelina variety with a different flower and colour
‘Star of Milano’ has a gold leaf margin and pink-flushed blooms