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READ MORE ARTICLES....
How to Create a Wildlife
Friendly Garden - BBC Easy Gardening
Growing the 10
Best Plants for Wildlife in your Garden - BBC Gardens Illustrated
A Flavour
of April in your Wildlife Friendly Garden - Country and Border Life
The Rural Craft
of Hedgelaying in Dorset - The Countryman
Managing your
Garden in October - Country and Border Life
The Historic
Welsh Gardens of Plas Tan y Bwlch - The Countryman
Looking after
the Bees in your Garden - Daily Express
Making Wildlife
Ponds the Easy Way - Daily Express
Wings over
Mull - a Centre for Birds of Prey - The Countryman
A New Garden for
Wildlife with Butterflies in Mind - Butterfly Conservation
The
Wildlife Art of Ian and Richard Lewington - Limited
Edition Magazine
'I went to
Noke and Nobody Spoke' - Fascinating Otmoor - Limited Edition
Magazine
Gardening on the
Wild Side of Town - New Consumer Magazine
Peter
Parks and the Great Rainforest Project - Limited Edition Magazine
The Countryside in January - Limited Edition
Magazine
The Countryside in May - Limited Edition
Magazine
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Contact Jenny to find out more about her freelance writing |
MAKING
A NEW
GARDEN FOR WILDLIFE WITH BUTTERFLIES IN MIND
Since constructing a
butterfly garden several years ago I have been asked many times whether it
was actually worth it. Do we have more species and greater numbers of
insects than before we put in all the hard work? The answer to that
question is an unqualified ‘Yes’. The success of the project has
been phenomenal, and that garden was visited or used for breeding by a
total of 24 species of butterfly and also had an excellent population of
moths, as well as a huge variety of other insects.
The project began
when I acquired an area of a commercial orchard on the suburban outskirts
of a large Oxfordshire village. The original insect fauna amongst the
apple and plum trees was poor - there was intensive spraying of a variety
of pesticides and fungicides on a weekly basis in the growing season: in
fact once spraying ceased, and an organic regime was implemented, a few of
the trees actually succumbed, overwhelmed by the pests to which they had
no natural resistance, after years of artificial help. Good numbers
of some butterfly species did exist in the commercial orchard. Red
admirals were abundant late in the summer, feasting on the fallen plums
and the occasional comma and speckled wood could also be seen. There were
no good butterfly habitats nearby, in spite of the fact that a local road
had been closed, leaving the verges to mature and wayside flowers to
bloom.
Careful planning
began, with the aim of increasing insect diversity by planting appropriate
species, particularly natives, and starting a management regime that was
friendly to all wildlife and to butterflies in particular. Some fruit
trees were removed to allow for the planting of a wildlife garden, but as
many as possible, nursed back to heath after their lifetime on chemicals,
were left to create green screens between different sections of the
garden.
The key was in the
planting. Cottage style borders were created using a wide selection of
nectar plants. Native species such as wild marjoram were included in the
nectar borders, and a selection of flowering and berry producing shrubs
including many Buddleia varieties, were planted in the borders where space
allowed. The whole garden was surrounded by a mixed native hedge with
large quantities of buckthorn, blackthorn, spindle, wayfaring tree, hazel
and hawthorn. A large ornamental willow hedge was planted to screen part
of the garden, and soon provided a habitat for some of our most
conspicuous moth larvae, (particularly White Satin in huge quantities)
Wildflower plugs were added to the sparse orchard grass, and other smaller
meadows were created using native grass seed and home grown wildflower
plugs. Even the vegetable garden was designed to be wildlife friendly,
with insect attracting plants between the rows, a Buddleia border to
screen it from the cottage garden and an edible flower border with many
varieties of nectar providing herbs.
The
garden matured and grew in spite of a poor dry soil. Eighteen species of
butterfly bred in the garden including Brown Argus and a small colony of
Marbled Whites. The management was all important, and the long grass
areas were only cut twice a year. Some tussocky grass was left completely
uncut between the trees to allow safe over-wintering habitats for many
varieties of invertebrates, as well as hibernation places for hedgehogs.
The
effort was well rewarded. As well as commas, blues, small tortoiseshells
and all those other beautiful winged creatures I desired, the garden had
many species of visiting and nesting bird, good populations of small
mammals including weasels thriving in the long grass, and a large colony
of great crested newts in the wildlife pond. It became a very pretty
garden into the bargain, not a forbidding tangle of overgrown shrubs and
uncut grass ( as the uninitiated imagine a wildlife garden to be) but an
attractive cottage style garden, with cool walks beneath the orchard trees
where the speckled woods flew, as well as colourful warm places between
gravel paths where clouds of sun-loving butterfly species congregate.
The hard work
continues but now elsewhere After 12 years creating this wonderful
garden I moved on to something even bigger - two acres in rural
Shropshire. Here the extra space gave me the opportunity to make
large wildflower meadows and a huge wildlife ponds as well as create
wildlife friendly herbaceous borders and vegetable beds. A garden of this
size always demands time and effort, and the management is all important
if the butterflies and other wildlife are to thrive. So is it all worth
it? There are times when, with my back aching, and my fingers full of wild
rose thorns or tingling from nettle stings, I wonder if it is. But then I
see ringlet butterflies dancing over the meadow, or gatekeepers feeding on
the wild marjoram, all just outside my back door, and I know I could never
have any other sort of garden.
©
Copyright Jenny Steel 2017 |
