A South East garden

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   Fantastic and great to hear we've all given some inspiration! Our wildlife garden is relatively tiny, but it packs a lot into a small space. Looking forward to updates and news of progress. I'm kind of a keen gardener, but have to be honest I prefer wildlife gardening as it is less of a chore. Intentionally untidy works for me and I'm much more easily motivated if I know my efforts will benefit wildlife. Just one tip, for many years I cut down a lot of the 'wild flowers' (weeds to my neighbours) because I thought it looked kind of grim over the winter months. Last year I didn't as I thought it might give the pond some protection from chemicals sprayed on the adjoining field. What I really noticed though by keeping all the standing vegetation is just how much it is used by birds as a food source when there is very little else available. Often had blue tits eating the left over seeds of the purple loosestrife during the winter and they are still enjoying them now! I was told a few years back by an entomologist how important leaving standing vegetation is for many bugs which hibernate in dead vegetation. So now I think we will always keep at least some of the old vegetation standing over the winter.

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GemmaJF Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Admin Group Joined: 25 Jan 2003 Location: Essex Status: Offline Points: 4359	Post Options Post Reply Quote GemmaJF Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 21 Feb 2018 at 1:28am
	Fantastic and great to hear we've all given some inspiration! Our wildlife garden is relatively tiny, but it packs a lot into a small space. Looking forward to updates and news of progress. I'm kind of a keen gardener, but have to be honest I prefer wildlife gardening as it is less of a chore. Intentionally untidy works for me and I'm much more easily motivated if I know my efforts will benefit wildlife. Just one tip, for many years I cut down a lot of the 'wild flowers' (weeds to my neighbours) because I thought it looked kind of grim over the winter months. Last year I didn't as I thought it might give the pond some protection from chemicals sprayed on the adjoining field. What I really noticed though by keeping all the standing vegetation is just how much it is used by birds as a food source when there is very little else available. Often had blue tits eating the left over seeds of the purple loosestrife during the winter and they are still enjoying them now! I was told a few years back by an entomologist how important leaving standing vegetation is for many bugs which hibernate in dead vegetation. So now I think we will always keep at least some of the old vegetation standing over the winter.

chubsta Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Senior Member Joined: 26 Apr 2013 Location: Folkestone,Kent Status: Offline Points: 430	Post Options Post Reply Quote chubsta Report Post Thanks(0) Quote Reply Posted: 20 Feb 2018 at 7:38pm
	Well, figured it is about time I put up some details of my own garden instead of jumping in on other peoples posts! So, with thanks to Gemma for the inspiration, here goes... I live in a smallish village on the cliff top between Folkestone and Dover in the very South East. Because of our proximity to the Continent we often have very different weather to the rest of the Uk and I believe we are now classed as semi-arid due to the low rainfall, it is very noticeable if you go just 20 miles North West how very different most days are. I have lived here for 20 years but for most of that time have had pretty much zero interest in maintaining the garden for wildlife but I guess as most of us get older we often discover where our true interests lie. I have always had a great number of fogs in the garden and have a decent sized pond for them, but apart from that the garden has been kept as low-maintenance as possible - just a lawn and hedges - as I just don't have time to do much, we have two houses and most of my spare time is spent at the other one. I guess it all changed about 6 years ago when I spotted some hedgehog droppings in the garden and my partner decided to buy me one of those cheap domed hedgehog houses. I put some food in a bowl inside it, went back indoors to fill the water bowl up and when I came back out there was a hedgehog in it! And that was me hooked - I am now far more conscious of the needs of wildlife and although most of the garden is still lawn I have a rough area of about 25 foot x 5 foot at the far end which is overgrown with logs and piles of compost and decaying vegetation. As time goes on I hope this will become more 'natural'. Thanks to advice and inspiration from here my pond is looking the healthiest it has ever been, and last year for the first time in forever I saw a couple of newts, and I also spotted slow-worms in a rough area near the conservatory. Hedgehogs, my main passion, seem to be maintaining numbers and I look forward to helping their survival prospects by becoming more proficient in treating them (unfortunately my local rescue closed down last year). Although I don't have much to do with my neighbours, when we do chat it is usually about the wildlife we have and it is clear that people in the immediate vicinity are very interested in helping create a good environment. So, to the future, this year I hope to do the following: improve the two 'rough' areas I have, making them more attractive to insects etc plant more around the edge of the pond - last years plantings have all done really well so with the advice on new ones to add from a post on here I should be able to create a good environment for the amphibians. I have a strip of unused ground about 25 foot x 1 foot along one edge, I am going to place pieces of corrugated sheeting along there in the hope it will be attractive to slow-worms and also for the hedgehogs to shelter and nest under. Put more cameras in - I have recently upgraded all my cameras to 4MP and 5MP ones and the quality is far better so will add a few more to better cover some blind spots, particularly around the pond. Unfortunately, I am rubbish at gardening and pretty much everything I have ever planted seems to die - I even tried to get ivy growing up a tree-stump and that died off as soon as I looked at it, so only time will tell how my efforts will pan out... Species list for 2018 is as follows: Hedgehog fox brown rat wood mouse field vole common frog here is a little photo of my current set-up, should be able to get an idea of what I have to work with...