Go native and plant the ultimate wildlife hotel! Winter is the perfect time for hedge planting, and if you seriously want to put conservation into action, planting a native hedge is an easy and effective way to help some of our most threatened UK species.
For most of us, large trees and woodland patches are beyond the scope of our modestly sized gardens, but native hedging plants function as mini woodlands which are absolutely teeming with wildlife. Supporting up to 80 per cent of our woodland birds, 50 per cent of our mammals and 30 per cent of our butterflies, the benefits of hedgerows to wildlife are indisputable. However, in some parts of the UK, up to 50% of hedgerows have disappeared. This is where gardeners can step in and make a real difference.
So, get planting your Hedgerow Hotel! Here is an introduction to just some of the wonderful guests who will be eagerly waiting to check in.
Annelise Brilli is the Horticultural Copywriter for Thompson and Morgan. Annelise caught the gardening bug from her mother, whose tiny backyard was crammed with a huge collection of plants. As an adult, she had a career change into horticulture, gaining a training apprenticeship with the National Trust at Powis Castle Garden in Welshpool. She went on to work in a range of private and public gardens, later running a garden design and maintenance business. She is passionate about sustainable gardening and has developed her own wildlife-friendly garden which she has opened as part of Macmillan Coastal Garden Trail.
We are in the midst of somewhat dark and difficult times. Newspapers, social media and television constantly reminding us of the troubles that loom uneasily around us. Every day seems like a battle. And yet, there is one battle that continues to fly beneath the radars of far too many of us; let alone the political leaders across our planet.
Our bee population is in a worrying state of decline. Without bees and other pollinators, there is no pollination of crops, 70% of which feed the world. And without food crops the survival of the human race itself is questionable. If current trends continue some bee species will be lost from Britain altogether; and one in ten of Europe’s wild bees will face extinction. It’s serious.
A number of factors are at play here including the ever topical climate change, the destruction of bees’ natural habitats and the continued overuse of bee killing pesticides.
Pollinators need food, water and shelter, and since World War II, 97% of our wildflower meadows (a natural habitat for wild bees) have been lost. As such, pollen and nectar rich flowers in our own green spaces provide both much needed food and indeed shelter for the beleaguered bee.
Planting to attract pollinators
As gardeners and plant lovers this is a call to arms. We need to stand shoulder to shoulder, trowel to trowel and do what we do best. Eliminate the usage of harmful pesticides and most effectively, plant, plant and plant more.
The plants that we so adore, that we spend our last single penny upon are the single most important factor in this worrying dilemma. Luckily, it’s a rousing cheer for us gardeners as we can cheerfully proclaim to our long-suffering but significant other halves, that we are helping to save the planet by buying more plants.
But what plants too choose? Like many garden centres and online plant retailers, Thompson & Morgan have adopted the beneficial ‘RHS Plants for Pollinators’ logo which highlights plants which will attract pollinators into our gardens.
Scan through Thompson & Morgan’s catalogue and you’ll see the ‘RHS Plants for Pollinators’ logo sprinkled liberally across its pages.
Attract pollinators all year round
As gardeners our endeavour is to attract these precious pollinators into our plots year-round. In the depths of our dreary winters plant cheerful, yellow winter aconites and beautifully scented Mahonia x media ‘Charity’. Spring heralds the much anticipated arrival of our beloved snowdrops, drifts of golden narcissus, stunning hellebores and a bounty of beautiful tulips, all of which will have the bees buzzing for joy. Summer naturally brings with it a seemingly never-ending parade of pollinating plants; a confection of Cosmos, fantastic fuchsias and geraniums galore. An endless summer bouquet of blooms. And finally, into the listless, mellow days of autumn, delightful dahlias, echinaceas, asters and the ever-popular bee magnet, sedums provide a final hurrah for our busy bees.
No matter what size our garden, be it a solitary, veronica packed window box, a hanging basket crammed with a cascade of lobelia or perhaps a single patio container playing host to exquisite agapanthus, there is no excuse.
It is estimated that there around 27 million gardeners in the UK (from a current population of 64 million). Think of the positive implications of each of us 27 million gardeners planting just one container of pollinating plants.
We have to take action before its too late. Let’s make sure the sting in this tale is ensuring we still have a bee population that has a sting in their tails. Find even more information and advice about plants for pollinators over on our dedicated hub page.
I am an experienced and professional gardener, designer and garden writer/blogger. I also have a successful podcast, ‘Mic the Gardener’ where I chat with well-known gardening celebrities, authors, garden designers and writers amongst others.
I set up my gardening business in 2004, having studied horticulture and garden design at Kingston Maurward college in Dorchester, where I gained the prestigious RHS Advanced Certificate in Horticulture.
In the past fifteen years I have maintained, designed and planted a wide range of gardens from small urban gardens to large sprawling countryside gardens.
With a life-long passion for gardening, I have a good knowledge of plants and have created many beautifully planted gardens during my career, including my own prize winning gardens in Bournemouth.
For more information about me and my popular gardening videos please visit my website www.mike-palmer.com or check out my Instagram @mike_thegardener
We all love creatures great and small, right? I’d far rather employ birds and bees to reduce pests than use chemicals, and so we go to great lengths to entice them into our garden. But there’s the small matter of our six cats to consider. Our solution? The ‘Catio’. By encasing the pergola covering our 27ft x 8ft patio with wire mesh, we’ve created a safe outdoor environment for our cats to enjoy fresh air and exercise, whilst protecting local birds!
Browse our full range of wild bird food to encourage feathered visitors to your outside space.
Caroline Broome has been gardening for more than 20 years. Having passed the RHS General Certificate, she has since developed her East Finchley garden into a “personal paradise” that she and her husband invite the public to visit each year via the National Garden Scheme. Learn more about our contributor using T&M’s ‘Meet the experts’ page.
This waxwing is a regular visitor to Nic’s garden Image: dogwooddays
In January, Nic Wilson of dogwooddays was astonished to see a female blackcap in the garden during the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch. It was a new species for her and, even better, it turned up at just the right time to be counted! She also has regular winter visits from redwing, feeding on next door’s cotoneaster, and waxwing in the birch trees behind her house.
Here are Nic’s top tips for attracting birds to your garden, including plants that they particularly love…
How to attract birds
Plan to include a few more berry-bearing plants such as Nic’s beautiful ivy Image: dogwooddays
In the winter and early spring it’s crucial to provide food for birds, to help them survive the colder months. This can be in the form of seeds and nuts – in our garden the finches love sunflower hearts and starlings flock to feed on the fat balls – but berries, seedheads and overwintering insects also offer hungry birds sustenance in the garden.
Winter is also an ideal time to plan simple changes to your garden that will encourage birds to visit throughout the year. It’s estimated that there are 400,000 hectares of garden habitat across the UK, and this could make a real difference if it were used creatively to support birdlife.
Stock up feeding stations
A redwing pauses for brief respite Image: dogwooddays
The RSPB advise us to feed birds throughout the year, but winter is a key time to keep bird feeders topped up and ensure that there’s plenty of fresh water to drink. In colder months, fill feeders and bird tables with sunflower and niger seeds, or a quality wild bird seed mix.
Peanuts are a good food source, but they shouldn’t be provided whole. Only purchase peanuts from a quality retailer who guarantees that they’re free from aflatoxin, a natural toxin that can kill birds. Fresh mealworms, fatballs (remove any nylon meshbags first) and fruit – soft apples and pears cut in half, or bananas – are also ideal winter fare. It’s essential that feeders are kept clean or you can do more harm than good.
Growing your own seed-bearing plants is a great way to feed birds throughout the year. Sunflowers provide huge heads of seed, while poppy, teasel, allium, echinacea, phlomis and many other garden favourites also have seeds that can be left over winter to attract birds like finches to the garden. As I write, a charm of goldfinches has descended on our verbena, bouncing on the seedheads as they pick out the seeds.
Supplying bird boxes is the easiest way to encourage birds to nest in the garden. We regularly hosted blue and great tits as they nested in boxes my children had made with their grandad.
Hedges and trees are important as they offer sheltered spots for birds to nest. Just be sure to avoid cutting hedges in the breeding season (early March – end of August) to protect any nests that might be in use during this period.
Encourage insects
Birds like this long tailed tit are attracted to gardens with lots of insects Image: dogwooddays
The more insects in your garden, the more birds will be attracted to feed. Avoid chemical products and use organic growing methods to encourage healthy ecosystems that will support large numbers of minibeasts.
A perfect, tidy garden isn’t ideal for wildlife – creating ‘wild’ areas with piles of logs, sticks and stones helps to encourage a range of insects. Leave stems and seedheads over winter to offer shelter to insects during the cold winter months.
Bring on the berries
This pyracantha hedge looks gorgeous and provides a feast of winter berries Image: dogwooddays
Trees and plants with berries offer rich pickings for birds, and they add colour to the garden during the bleakest months. More unusual garden birds like fieldfare, redwing, mistle thrush and waxwing love to visit berry-laden shrubs, giving us fabulous views of these beautiful birds. Try planting:
If your garden is too small for trees or large shrubs, try climbers like honeysuckle ‘Hall’s Prolific’ or ivy ‘Glacier’ that grow vertically and provide nourishing berries for the birds throughout the autumn and winter.
Nic Wilson is an author, editor and Guardian Country Diarist based in North Hertfordshire. Her debut nature memoir, Land Beneath the Waves,was published in June by Summersdale/Hachette.
Nic works for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine and her writing has featured in numerous journals and magazines including The English Garden, The Garden (RHS Magazine), BBC Wildlife Magazine and the John Clare Society Journal. She enjoys growing flowers and unusual fruit, vegetables and herbs, and loves to encourage nature into the garden. Nic volunteers with her local Wildlife Trust.
Important pollinators like bees, butterflies and moths are in decline Image: Marek Mierzejewski
Bees, butterflies and other pollinators are under threat, so there’s never been a better time for gardeners to help by adding a few plants to support them. Here, Mandy Bradshaw from The Chatty Gardener shares five simple tips to help make your garden a refuge for pollinators.
1. Be part of the solution
Residential gardens and allotments are an important lifeline for pollinators Image: Paul Stout
I love watching the bees in my garden squeezing into a foxglove flower, noisily feasting on opium poppies in the veg plot or enjoying the winter honeysuckle.
Gardening without chemicals and trying to choose nectar-rich flowers means bees and other pollinators are often buzzing around my plot – good to watch and helping my flowers and veg set fruit or seed.
Increasingly, our gardens are becoming an important lifeline for these beneficial insects and go some way to counter the effects of natural habitat loss and the use of pesticides.
A recent study found that urban allotments and gardens are vital sources of food for pollinators – especially when they have native plants such as brambles and dandelions, and traditional favourites like lavender and marigolds.
So, to hear the sound of bees in your garden, make the decision to actively support our pollinators – it’s the first important step.
2. Choose the right plants
A quiet corner of this walled garden has been dedicated to wildflowers Image: Shutterstock
The very best plants for pollinators are ‘species’, as modern cultivars can be sterile or have low nectar and pollen levels. If you grow your own vegetable seeds, try to include some heritage varieties among the modern cultivars.
When it comes to the flower garden, plants with open, single blooms are better than double flowers where the nectar can be difficult to reach.
Incorporate some wildflowers in your garden, or even leave a corner where you allow weeds such as nettles and dandelions to thrive. Let your grass wait a little longer before you get the lawnmower out, to allow the clover to flower. Allowing ivy to flower will also provide important food for bees.
Think about adding a few flowers to your vegetable patch to help pollinate your crops. I edge my beds with the common marigold (Calendula officinalis). It looks pretty and draws in those helpful insects.
3. Give a good mix
The mahonia’s large yellow flower spikes bloom from November through to March Image: John Glover
Different insects like different plants, so make sure you have a range of flower shapes to ensure your garden helps them all. Some bees, for example, have long tongues to cope with plants such as aconitum.
Grow a mix of perennials and annuals and don’t forget trees and shrubs. Both can be excellent sources of nectar for bees and butterflies.
Think about planting to cover the seasons. Like the gardener, pollinators need food all-year-round, so it’s important to plant for more than just the summer! Early spring and autumn are the seasons when nectar can be particularly short in supply, but adding just a few of the right plants can make all the difference. Good spring plants are crocus and hellebores, while a winter feast can be provided by snowdrops, mahonia or sarcococca.
Take a look at Thompson & Morgan’s Perfect for Pollinators range which includes a selection of seed and plant varieties known to attract bees, butterflies and other pollinating insects.
Try to garden without using pesticide sprays as they often kill beneficial insects alongside the pests.
Instead, encourage birds, ladybirds and other gardeners’ friends in to deal with any problems. For instance, the larvae of hoverflies voraciously consume aphids. Similarly, when they hatch, ladybird larvae can eat up to 5,000 aphids as well as attacking red spider mites.
To attract these helpful insects plant things like marigolds, alyssum, cosmos, dill, yarrow, penstemon and fennel.
Make or buy an insect house to give solitary bees and others somewhere to nest. Something as simple as an old terracotta plant pot filled with lengths of bamboo can be used as a bee hotel.
I hope this has given you plenty of food for thought. Just a few simple changes can turn your garden into a wildlife sanctuary that provides vital food and shelter for our precious pollinators. For more advice and pollinator-specific recommendations, visit our hub page.
Cotswold-based, Garden Media Guild member, Mandy Bradshaw is also known as the Chatty Gardener. Passionate about gardening and writing, her beginnings are in football reporting for her primary school, and Mesembryanthemum planting with her mother. Winner of the ‘Garden Journalist of the Year’ in the 2018 Property Press Awards, she writes for not only her own blog but also newspapers, magazines and other sites.
