Wildlife in the Garden.

Sounds fantastic! It's great to hear you're gardening in an environmentally friendly way. It's only a small step but I ordered our first ever compost bin last week (only £8 from the council).

Thank you Peter. One tip, if you want the heap to get hot enough to kill off weed seeds, save stuff in a big bucket to add to the heap and only open it occasionally. It's handy to have two bins, one rotting down and one in use.

How long have you been there?

Hi Spritz, about 2yrs and 6 months now. We concentrated on clearing the back garden first.and getting the veg/ fruit going, now we are tackling the front garden, though it's slow all this rain doesn't help!

Your garden sounds like my own idea of Paradise. We once had a lovely, wildlife-frinedly garden at a previous home, where the butterflies had to flutter across the patio table, we were never short of ladybirds and hedgehogs, and we helped raise families of blue tits in home-made nest boxes. I miss that small garden very much.When we were selling, the buyer asked me to finish off a couple of things, which I did, but within months he had ripped everything out!! I was, and still am, so angry about it.

Hi David, shame on them doing that to your garden. Our garden backs on to Lady Davenports Estate and there is an uncultivated wildlife strip around the estate, between us and them, so we benefit from that too.On the other side of the lane is Paul McCartneys land also organic wildlife friendly. At the moment baby rabbits eat off the verges in the lanes so we drive slowly. We have little owls and tawny owls, moles voles shrew and woodmice, pheasants with chicks, badgers, one or two foxes, though we see more foxes in the towns lately.I feel very privilidged to live here, love it! there are wild boar in he woodland too, but they are shy, we see their prints and wallows mostly they stay out of sight.

We love the rural life, too, although badgers come in the garden at night and snuffle around the lawns to find crane fly larvae then in the morning, the grass is quite a mess! I don't really mind. I'd like to watch them but they don't let me know what time they come!! Rabbits sometimes visit us, so do pheasants. The best visitor is the heron which stands like a statue overlooking the stream. Last year, an egret came several times. Haven't seen any foxes in the garden, but they are around. Owls live in the old ash tree, and we get green woodpeckers. We also have a number of grass snakes which make me jump! Slowworms too, but they are smaller. We have bats living in our roof space, and they are lovely to watch at twilight. The farm ducks and ducklings come up the stream but flap away rapidly if the dog is in the garden! Each year a wild mallard nests somewhere along the bank, not in the bit I'm working on. She hides her nest really well. Never a dull moment! We moved from a busyish area to a rural one, and love the contrast! I can breathe here...No exhaust fumes!

Hi Spriitz, your garden sounds and looks lovely, is the river you mention the one in your pics? Not likely to flood I hope?

I did everything in reverse and found myself moving from the countryside to the city - in Japan! In the cities and suburbs there you hardly see any wildlife at all, the occasional butterfly bigger and brighter than anything we have here but not the same... I always miss the sound of birds roosting at dusk and the total blackness that comes at night. Now I live in the Heathrow flightpath and make the most of going back to my parents house to catch up on fresh air, green and wildlife.

To answer Tussie first - on the map it's actually called a brook. Usually it babbles along but after heavy rain it rises alarmingly quickly and yes, it does flood! We have seen it go right over the lane to our cottage and make the ford in the lane impassable. Last time was Jan 6th when we went wassailing in an orchard down the lane... the water came over my wellies and I had to dance around the apple trees squelching as I went. What an experience - tradition rules in Somerset! We do also know that next door has had flood water inside in the past, not for some years though! No good worrying about it, but we've all got flood barriers ready in case.

joey - our daughter also lives under the flight path to Heathrow. When we visit, we are very aware of the noise, hustle and bustle and can't wait to return to our rural idyll. I feel for you and I will think of you when we are outside watching the stars (another huge benefit of country life - no light pollution!)

Joey my partners son lives near Heathrow, I sometimes visit up there,we have very little light pollution, often check out the night sky before going to bed,
Spritz, I wll keep my fingers crossed for you if we get more heavy rain, I lauged at your description of wassailing in squelchy wellies!!

Yes, it is great to have an adjoining wildlife strip to help out with the garden. We had a narrow woodland strip at the bottom of the garden we used to have, and it definitely helped in the planning of that garden. Beyond the woodland strip was a largish "field" - really, an area of unused land which had developed itself into a natural wildlife oasis. I always looked forward to taking our dog out there, so I could see the wildflowers, peacock butterflies, moths, toads, etc. Guess what? That land belonged to the Council, they sold it off to a developer and now it has almost 60 houses on it! Now we live in a village on a private, unmade road, and the surrounding environment is, I hope, more stable.

Hi David, behind the strip there is a field, and behind that woodland, more fields ponds etc and an old churchyard and lots of really old oaks and elms, those house a terriffic number of species.

Now I am turning a shade of emerald green - with envy (ha ha). It seems to me that your home and garden are so much part of that larger environment, and so you reap the rewards. I want to sometime do a nature survey with the kids, beginning in our garden, and extending, so your kind reply has made me remember this and put it on my "to do list".

Hi David, have you seen this link, might interest you and the children?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/wildbritain/gardenwildlife/

Many thanx 4 that tip, Tussie, I should have thought of it as my Internet Provider is the BBC and so I will have that link to hand somewhere. We always take part in the Spring Birdwatch and I have photos of wildlife in our garden which include toads, butterflies and hedgehogs, but i ned to teach the kids more about bes, hoverflies and wasps, etc., as they either run a mile from them or try to kill them!

I really love this Blog, it makes a nice refreshing change to hear about saving
and preserving Wildlife. What would our lives be without them?
The joy and pleasure they give us, and yet they never get the chance to
live their lives peacefully day after day! We have all stolen their
Habitats......So where are they supposed to live?
Its nice to know that all of us at GOY are doing our best for them.
I do all i can in my Garden for the Wildlife, an they repay me by visiting
regularly, which i enjoy!
I use everything Natural in my haven, do all my own Compost,grow wildflowers
and have a little plot of weeds ina corner, for Insects. All back to Nature
So I think you are great Tussiemussie for what you are doing.....Keep it up!!