Our new garden water feature has worked a treat.
Not only does it look and sound good but part of the intention was to provide some water for garden wildlife. Whilst sat out in the sunshine late on Sunday afternoon we saw first a Willow Warbler take a bath in it followed by a Great Tit having a drink.
It’s great when these things work out just the way you wanted them to.
It was Morgans School Fete yetserday and the theme was ‘The Circus’.
Thankfully the rain held off and we all had fun. Morgan went dressed as a clown wearing a home made bow-tie, my shorts, my shoes, a red nose and a clowns hat which looked pretty good.
We all raised lots of money for the school, had a chance to chat with other parents, won lots of prizes and even bought some books and plants for the garden. I quite like going to these events and helping out with the school always feels worthwhile.
Whilst on a treasure hunt Anna and I had a look at the wildlife garden they have as well, which looks good. We’re hoping to get involved helping out with that and maybe even setting up the noth trap there now and then so that the children can see some of the moths that inhabit their garden at night.
Morgan as a Clown
Chives
Forget-me-Nots
Things are coming on well in the garden. The spring flowers are still out but are fading. The Marsh Marigolds have almost finished, the Bluebells will soon follow them. The Forget-me-Nots are still in full bloom though and providing a lovely haze of blue around the garden..
Everything else seems to be doing well though Irises on about to flower as are some of the Geraniums. The Clematis – which has been struggling to get established – is now in flower. The new beds are filling out will and the lack of wind has seen things growing well. Phlox, Goldenrod and other perennials are all coming on well. All of the new plants are settling in well too.
Even the new raised vegetable bed is coming on well. I’m not sure about the happiness of the tomato plants, but the potatoes and Kale are growing fast, the carrots, leeks and spring onions have germinated and the beans and courgettes that we have in pots are ready ready to be planted out.
Vegetable Bed
Potato Planters
Beans and Courgettes
So far it has been a great spring for the garden and all is looking well.
It has of course been keeping me busy. I’ve been trying to improve the lawn which is a constant ongoing process. There are of course ‘weeds’ where I don’t want them that have been removed but in many places I leave them be as many of them look nice and they all add to the species in the garden and the overall wildlife present.
Talking of garden wildlife, the caterpillar invasion continues and there are now big fat juicy Lackey Moth caterpillars all over the garden. I’m not quite sure how they get from their silk nests on the hawthorn and willow to other far reaches of the garden but they do and some of them are now huge. They do eat some leaves and therefore damage some of the plants I’ve been carefully tending, but they also provide lots of food for the birds and some of them will make it through to moth-hood and end up being recorded in my moth trap. They aren’t creating widespread devastation and things seem to be in pretty good balance.
Primula
The other day I was having a discussion with Morgan (who is 5) about the number of species of plants and animals that live in our garden. Ever since he has been going on to me to write a list of every plant and animal that I can think of that we’ve seen in the garden. It is going to be quite an undertaking and I shall have to research some of the species of plant that we have. The vertebrates should be relatively easy, but when it comes to the invertebrates that may take a little more effort.
It should be fun devising such a list though so we will be starting it soon. Don’t worry, I’ll be limiting it to those that we can see with the naked eye, I’m not going to start delving into the microscopic just yet! Even so, I think we’ll easily get to several hundred with just the ones I already know, once I start researching the ones I don’t know the list will go on and on even in our little patch of the world.
It should be an interesting exercise if nothing else.
What we have to Work With
I always enjoy gardening, especially the planning and landscaping of a garden, but here on the coast of West Wales, gardening of any type is challenging. We have to contend with poor soil (sand to be precise), strong winds and salty air. Coming up with any sort of a ‘garden’ is difficult and most people just have a lawn with the odd shrub.
I want to make ours a little more interesting than this and have been gradually working on doing so. We’ve had a few set backs here and there thanks to having the garden completely obliterated by diggers a couple of times, but we are now getting there.
Over the past couple of years we’ve gradually been adding new beds and borders, enriching these with compost and planting wind resistant plants that will act as shelter for other plants. It has also led to the development of some structure in the garden and I now have plans to take this further.
We need a largish fairly open area in the garden for Morgan to play so I’m leaving the area nearest to the house for now as lawn. I built a Pergola halfway down the garden a couple of years ago and this is now an integral part of the garden. Beyond this I want to create a more ornamental, interesting garden with plenty of plants and some structure. Rather than just a piece of grass surrounded by shrubs and flowers I want to create a garden that leads you on and encourages to explore a little further. I want separate, distinct areas to the garden and to create a bit of a journey’ as you go through it.
Now, all of this sounds a little too grand and in truth it is. We don’t have a huge garden so only have so much to work with and with the constraints of the wind and soil it is never going to be a show garden but I do have plans that I think will make it more interesting. The first of these is a to separate the garden into three distinct sections.
Lawned Area
The top of the garden is lawn for Morgan to play on, and where we have a table and chairs, barbeque, shed etc.
Ornamental Garden
The next section will be more decorative with plenty of interesting shrubs, herbs and flowers and a couple of seating areas. At the moment it is surrounded by borders with shrubs and herbs in and I started work on the rest of it over the weekend. I’ve dug out a large bed in the middle that will eventually contain some larger shrubs, lots of bulbs and a collection of any other plants I can lay my hands on. I’d especially like to put fragrant plants and herbs here as there will be a coupe of seating areas nearby.
Border Edging
The large central border also breaks up the garden forcing you to go either left or right around it after walking through the pergola. Rather than being presented with a large space with flowers around it, you have a choice to make and somewhere to go.
One of the seating areas is going to be raised slightly and graveled, and I’ve been working on that too over the weekend. I’ve put a border of logs around it and now need to get some gravel to fill it in. It isn’t raised by much, but it will be enough to give a little change to an otherwise very flat garden.
As always, disposing of the waste from this posed a problem, but I used the turf to build little walls at the bottom of the garden, which is to become a wildlife garden and a little wooded glade (maybe).
Turf Wall
New Flower Bed
The New Seating Area
Wildlife Garden
The third area will be a little more wild with trees, slightly longer grass and other things of interest to wildlife. It will be separated from the middle part by a screen of Pampas grass, shrubs and Bamboo. It also houses the compost bins, other piles of garden waste and may even have a beehive in it soon if we get around to it. The trees we have here at the moment are mainly native Willows and Poplars, with some Lodgepole Pine and I’ve planted a Birch tree and an Oak.
Of course, we have had a nice spring so far weather-wise, so I may have been lulled into a false sense of optimism. We could get some winds anytime now that will destroy everything, including all of my plans. It is however nice to have some plans and have a vision to aim for. It won’t be easy but it should be fun trying.
After our pretty harsh winter, everything in the garden is tentatively poking its head out to see if Spring really has arrived. It’s nice to see everything coming back to life and despite the weather most things seem to have made it through.
Signs of Spring
All the activity prompted us to get the garden furniture out of the shed and even buy a new bench from the garden centre. We’ve been meaning to get some seating in the garden but had just never got around to it, but now its there and ready to be sat on once things warm up a bit.
We also bought a Silver Birch tree for the bottom of the garden. We don’t know how well it will stand up to the wind here but I want to make the bottom of the garden a little more ‘wooded’ so thought it was worth a try. Hopefully another species of tree will attract more wildlife and increase the number of moth species I manage to trap too.
Of course, all of this furniture and the extra tree are just create more obstacles that will make mowing the lawn more difficult but I guess that’s a small price to pay.
Grow little tree, grow
My summer office?
As well as attracting lots of wildlife to your garden, a wildlife garden also gives you an excuse to be a bit lazy with the gardening from time to time! It isn’t just about bird boxes and ponds; just as important are areas of unkempt garden and piles of logs and sticks.
We don’t have huge garden here, but it is always nice to see wildlife in it so we do various things to attract wildlife. We have several bird feeders offering peanuts, seeds and fat balls. We have a few areas of unkempt garden with wild flowers and grasses growing in them. We have a little nest box on one of the trees at the bottom of the garden.
As far as maintenance goes, then we try to leave dead seed heads and such like for a while before cutting them back. In fact we try to leave most cutting back until spring. We keep the use of pesticides and other chemicals to a minimum. We also have piles of dead wood, compost bins and heaps of sticks all of which help attract wildlife.
It does work too. We have had 24 species of bird to the garden, frogs, toads and newts, numerous butterflies and moths, grass snakes, and as far as mammals go, hedgehog, rabbit, squirrel, mice, bats and even a ferret!
If you want to know how wildlife friendly your garden is and get more hints and tips then Natural England have set up a website called the Big Wildlife Garden. You can add you garden to it and list the features that you have. Our garden is on there and the latest few things we have done mean we have 53 points and a gold certificate! I think I need to build a bird bath next.
How does your garden fare?
As I was rigging my windsurf kit up on the edge of the dunes here at Ynyslas yesterday, a big squall hit with 40 knot winds and heavy rain. I sat there huddled over my kit as a stoat ran out from the grass, sheltered under my sail for a few seconds and then scurried off into the grass again.
I haven’t seen a stoat in the dunes before, so that’s another species to add to my list!
Copyright Keven Law
Blue Tits on a feeder
Although we live in a rural location surrounded by countryside, we don’t get a huge variety of birds to our feeders. It isn’t surprising really as the countryside around is is fairly sparse. There are few trees, and the ones that do grow are small and stunted and the number of different habitats that we do have are fairly specialised. There isn’t much in the way of cover for most birds so it is always nice when we see something a little unusual.
Yesterday we spotted a woodpecker in the garden. I only saw it in flight and then perched on a telegraph pole and it was silhouetted the whole time so I’m not sure which type it was, but it was definitely a woodpecker so that’s one we can add to our garden list.
It did prompt me to try writing a list of birds we have seen in the garden. So, in approximate order of ‘abundance’ here they are:
- Starling
- Sparrow
- Chaffinch
- Blue Tit
- Blackbird
- Robin
- Magpie
- Great Tit
- Jackdaw
- Collared Dove
- Dunnock
- Pied Wagtail
- Crow
- Song Thrush
- Swallow
- Gold Finch
- Wren
- Wood Pigeon
- Red Kite
- Linnet
- Redwing
- Chiffchaff
- Cuckoo
- Sparrowhawk
- Skylark
- Snipe
- Woodpecker
- Curlew
- Grey Heron
I am trying to feed the birds a little more this year and we have a nesting box and a few other wildlife friendly features in the garden. At the moment it has resulted in an increased number of birds to the garden, but the species count is still quite low.
My next project will be to get decent photos of them all.
Although living in a rural location, there is little tree cover nearby and therefore the variety of birds we get in the garden is fairly limited.
Over the last few weeks we have had some new visitors though in the form of a pair of Linnets. These small finches are partial migrants to the UK and about the same size as a sparrow, but the males have a distinctive red head and breast. They certainly seem to be enjoying the forget-me-not seeds and I finally managed to take some photos of them the other day.
