The Wildlife Gardener's Almanac: A seasonal guide to increasing the biodiversity in your garden
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About this ebook
The ultimate guide to encouraging wildlife into the garden all year round.
Taking a month-by-month approach, The Wildlife Gardener's Almanac is packed with ideas, advice, tips and checklists, to give gardener's the best chance to make their contribution to conserving our native flora and fauna, no matter what size their garden.
Each chapter of this beautifully illustrated book presents an introduction to the wild plants and creatures to expect at that time of the year, lists of seasonal tasks with straightforward instructions on how to carry them out, detailed profiles of plants in bloom, and a practical project aimed at encouraging more wildlife into the garden, including making a wildlife pond, building a nest box, planning a herb bed, planting a wildflower meadow and more.
With appendices covering wildlife gardening in containers and suggested garden layouts, this guide offers a wealth of gardening information in an accessible format, allowing gardeners to find the advice they need, exactly when they need it.
Jackie Bennett
Jackie Bennett is originally from a small town in Northern Wisconsin. She moved to the Twin Ports when she was young. In her former life, Jackie was an over-the-road truck driver with her husband. She spent hours traveling all over the United States and Canada listening to audiobooks. She retired from the open road when she had her first daughter. She now has three children, and she still loves to read. Although audiobooks are still her go-to, so she has her hands free! Along with her family, including their adorable dog Doug, she loves to explore state and national parks and enjoy the outdoors. Her family holds a special place in her heart, and she gets inspiration from them.
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The Wildlife Gardener's Almanac - Jackie Bennett
INTRODUCTION
In the context of garden history as a whole, wildlife gardening is a relative newcomer. Like many new ideas, it has taken some time to become accepted by the gardening establishment and for its practitioners not to be considered as dangerous ‘alternatives’. My first brush with the idea of inviting wildlife into the garden (rather than trying to keep it out) was in the early 1980s, when I was helping to plan the opening of a new theatre complex in the city of Stoke-on-Trent. The theatre grounds were being converted into an urban nature reserve with ponds, meadows and woodland, providing a much-needed resource for local schoolchildren and theatregoers.
Designed by landscape consultant Chris Baines, it was an incredibly brave and innovative concept at the time – and one which must have risked considerable professional ridicule. The essence of the plan was contained on just four sheets of paper with the headings: Meadow, Woodland Edge, Hedgerow and Water – not the usual terminology of architects. It was nevertheless a very simple but effective way of mentally dividing up a plot of land, be it a domestic garden or a potential building site.
Those four sheets of paper have travelled with me ever since. The basic good sense of the idea of creating landscapes for wildlife, as well as for people, had converted me to wildlife gardening long before I ever had a garden. Nowadays, wildlife gardening is quite a respectable activity and we can all play a part in the revolution that Chris Baines and the conservationists started. But, as with all revolutions, we need a handbook in order to make those ideas work in our own particular situation. This book is therefore first and foremost a practical gardening book – for all those people who are swept away by the spirit of wildlife gardening, but have never quite got round to converting that enthusiasm into reality.
SEASONS AND MONTHS
Under average conditions, the terms ‘early’, ‘mid’ and ‘late’ season as used throughout the book correspond to the following months:
SPRING
Early: March
Mid: April
Late: May
SUMMER
Early: June
Mid: July
Late: August
AUTUMN
Early: September
Mid: October
Late: November
WINTER
Early: December
Mid: January
Late: February
BACK TO BASICS
The secret of making a haven for wildlife, on whatever scale, is to recreate the habitats found in nature. To the four headings already mentioned (water, woodland edge, meadow and hedgerow) I would add wetland, flower borders, compost heap and, most importantly, an untidy patch which is barely ‘gardened’ at all.
Most gardeners already have some of these habitats although they might not think of them in those terms. Gardening for wildlife does not necessarily mean changing the structure of the garden or throwing out the received wisdom of conventional gardening. There are, however, some key issues to be considered. Chemicals and wildlife, are not, on the whole, complementary. There are some chemical products available which do not leave a residue in the soil and there are those which are designed to be more selective in the pests that they kill. Bear in mind however that every input of chemical, natural-based or artificially manufactured, upsets the balance of pest and pest-eater. Many scientists believe that aphids manage to produce exactly the right number of offspring to support the current population of ladybirds. By wiping out one, we deprive the other of its main means of survival. One of the major arguments for not trying to control pests, is that birds and insects, if left alone, do it so much more effectively.
The most liberating aspect of wildlife gardening is knowing that a little untidiness is a good thing. Suddenly the pressure to keep up appearances is gone and it is socially acceptable to sweep the leaves under the hedge and leave piles of clippings in a corner. Having said that, wildlife gardens do have to be managed.
Native plants are the first choice, not because of some purist philosophy, but because, in general, they support a greater range of species. Nevertheless, birds, insects and mammals are great opportunists and, having established essential ecological relationships with native trees, shrubs and meadow flowers, they will top up their food supplies from any nectar- or berry-bearing plant.
In this book, non-native plants are included if they are particularly useful to wildlife; by the same token native plants, and especially endangered species which gardeners can help to conserve, are included and considered to be ‘wildlife’. Strictly speaking, ‘native’ plants – those which were present in the British Isles before the rise in sea-levels finally separated the islands from the continent of Europe – are a fairly limited group, and since many more species have become ‘naturalised’ than are truly native, the two are generally grouped together. Naturalised plants may have been imported (accidentally or otherwise) but they behave like natives, thriving in the prevailing climate and soils without human intervention. When we think about creating a wild garden (as opposed to a wildlife garden) we would think only of these native and naturalised plants that take care of themselves. Gardening for wildlife, on the other hand, allows the gardener to draw on a much wider range of plant species, be they native, naturalised or exotic.
One important facet of gardening for wildlife that is sometimes overlooked is the use of colour. Most gardeners employ some element of design in choosing plants in colours that they like or that blend in with an overall colour scheme. For wildlife, and insects in particular, we might make different choices. Flowers may be pollinated by wind and other methods but mainly they rely on insects. The colours and patterns of flowers are not primarily for our benefit, but function as a signalling system to attract these insects: butterflies and flies like yellows and blues, bees prefer blues, reds and purples (which reflect ultraviolet light) and moths go to white. Scent works in co-operation with colour; butterflies seem to gravitate towards heavy scents and bees to lighter, sweeter ones. Moths being night-flying are attracted to those plants which are at their most fragrant in the evening, such as honeysuckle and white campion.
As gardeners, we can be choosy about who (or what) we invite into our gardens. People whose gardens are visited by deer know how quickly a young rose bush can be stripped of its leaves. Others, living in cities, would gladly sacrifice their roses for even the most fleeting glimpse of a mammal of this size. Similar arguments apply to foxes and squirrels. We cannot control nature, but we can to some extent welcome or discourage certain sections of the wildlife population. Conventional gardening books are full of tips to frighten away unwanted wildlife and it is these that the reader must turn to if certain species have become a nuisance. This book starts from the premise that the reader wants to attract a greater range of creatures into the garden.
PLANT TYPES
Note that plants are described by their commonly used names (where applicable) as well as by their botanical names. Plants should be considered hardy unless stated otherwise.
ANNUAL: Germinates and flowers the same year, then dies.
BIENNIAL: Germinates one year, flowers the next, then dies.
PERENNIAL: Survives for many years.
BULB: Underground storage organ, developed from bases of the leaves.
CORM: Underground storage organ, developed from the bases of the stems.
RHIZOME: Underground stem.
TUBER: Underground organ, developed from the roots and underground stems.
SHRUB: Woody plant, branching from ground level, usually smaller than a tree.
TREE: Woody plant with a central trunk, usually taller growing than a shrub.
USING THE BOOK
By dividing the book into months, the aim is to make practical information accessible to the gardener at any time of the year. If, for example, you would like to know which routine jobs should be undertaken in the wildlife garden at a particular time of year, you need simply turn to the ‘Tasks for the Month’ pages for the relevant month. On the other hand, if you want to locate information on specific plants, habitats, creatures and so on, use the index to direct you to the appropriate pages.
Each chapter is divided into four sections: an introduction to the wildlife and weather to be expected that month, a checklist of the main tasks and instructions on how to carry them out, profiles of plants which are useful to wildlife, and a major practical project for those who want to increase the range of habitats available to wildlife. (For those wanting to find out about different habitats and their value in the garden, the practical project section also provides an overview.) In addition, the Appendices provide information on wildlife gardening with containers, as well as a selection of garden plans, which can be used as a starting point for your own ideas.
In some areas, the seasons may not coincide exactly with those of the book. For this reason, the terms mid-spring and late autumn are used to denote planting and sowing times, for example, rather than specify a month which might be incorrect for particularly cold or mild regions. With experience, gardeners get to know the vagaries of their own climate; but the information in Seasons and Months may be used as a guide for average conditions.
Too many of us worry about the state of our gardens, thinking of them as an extension of the house to be cleaned up and made tidy. I hope this book will help more people actually enjoy their gardens and let the local wildlife judge whether or not they come up to standard.
HARMFUL PLANTS
Some garden and native plants, including their seeds and berries, can be toxic to humans and animals. Check the list of potentially harmful plants on the Royal Horticultural Society website (see Resources) for advice, particularly if you have children or pets.
KEY TO PLANT LISTS
Throughout the book you will find lists of plants for specific uses and these have been coded as follows:
B = Bee plant
C = Caterpillar food plant
N = Butterfly nectar plant
S = Seeds for birds
F = Fruit/berries/nuts for birds/mammals
H = Attractive to hoverflies
I = Large number of associated insects
Nat = Native or naturalised
Po = Poisonous
E = Evergreen
M = Moths
R = Rare in the wild
W = Suitable for wetland garden
JANUARY
One of the best things about a wildlife garden is that winter is a season to be welcomed rather than dreaded. Unlike a conventional garden, where a small selection of carefully chosen shrubs provides artificial ‘winter colour’, the wildlife garden is rich in its own seasonal plants, birds and animals. Gardeners tend to dislike this time of year, yet this feeling that everything is ‘on hold’ is part of its charm. If a layer of snow falls, there is little to beat the absolute stillness of a winter’s day. Of course, this calm is deceptive and lasts only as long as it takes for the first track marks to appear in the virgin snow. Just beneath the surface, the garden is teeming with life.
Keeping an eye on the bird table from the warmth of the kitchen or living-room is one of the month’s chief pleasures. A great cross-section of users should show up, including all the regulars like blackbirds, thrushes, tits and robins. There may also be flocks of migrant fieldfares, redwing or siskins seeking shelter in suburbia from the cutting winds of the open fields.
When the temperature does lift above freezing and the sun emerges temporariIy to warm the earth, creatures like hedgehogs, which are normally hibernating, may stir from under a pile of leaves at the bottom of the hedge for a short food foray. Foxes are often seen in gardens during a hard winter, foraging for slugs and beetles. They are not averse to turning over a few rubbish bins either in their search for food.
As for plants, the snowdrop has become something of a cliché for the year. Yet the timing of the flower is perfect; just as we have given up hope of seeing a living plant, it emerges through the melting snow – a constant reminder that this is anything but the dead of winter.
TASKS FOR THE MONTH
Start a wildlife notebook
Feed birds consistently
Keep pond free of ice
Draw up plans for a wildlife garden
Order wildflower seeds
STARTING A WILDLIFE NOTEBOOK
At the start of the year, make a resolution to record the activity in your garden for one whole twelve-month cycle. Use a hardbacked notebook or desk diary and keep it somewhere near at hand so you can make notes when you come in from the garden. Every event is worth recording. from the appearance of the first snowdrop to the last holly berry disappearing in the beak of a visiting fieldfare.
Keeping a notebook is not just a pleasant exercise, it will also help you to plan next year’s garden and monitor changes in the frequency and behaviour of local wildlife. It doesn’t need to be elaborate or a literary masterpiece, just the date and a few notes will do. As the garden develops and the range of species increases, it will provide a lasting record not only for your own use, but perhaps for future owners of your house and garden.
LOOKING AFTER THE BIRDS
This is probably the month during which garden birds benefit most from a little human intervention. Natural food sources like windfallen apples and hawthorn berries have been used up by the population of local birds,