annie's wildlife gardening

Sheltering Butterflies, Caterpillars and Chrysallises

open door policy

Following up on a great suggestion from @save_butterflies I’ve been leaving my shed door open. Sure enough the other day a butterfly was sheltering up against the wooden wall at ground level. It’s no longer there. I didn’t get a photo. But that policy is working.

It’s part of a wider plan also from Butterfly Conservation to encourage caterpillars and shelter the ensuing butterflies especially this time of year. Goodness knows we could do with some sunshine.

Step 1

Encourage butterflies to lay eggs by providing popular food source for their caterpillars like nettles (popular with Peacocks, Red Admirals and as it turns out Commas). I’ve found, to my great excitement , 4 Comma – erstwhile caterpillars, now – chrysallises on this skimpy, shady patch of carefully nurtured nettles! (Nettles apparently like lots of nitrogen, so I’ve put my few grass clippings on them which seems to work well.)

close uo of nettles with Comma caterpillar

Step 2

Encourage the caterpillar eggs to be laid on nettles which, wait for it, are located next to a shed door – A shed door which you can leave ajar so that once those butterflies emerge from their chrysalis ( don’t know technical term sorry) they have somewhere to shelter – out of the rain and even over winter! The reason being some species especially if breeding late like these ones will prefer to overwinter as adult butterflies ready to emerge and start the whole process again next Spring!

I never knew that. Was vaguely aware of chrysallises along with cobwebs in old sheds but had no idea about adults sheltering – Some migrants like Red Admirals will even do that instead of flying back to Africa?!

provide a welcoming feast!

Step 3

Don’t forget to give the emerging butterflies something to eat before they go into winter hibernation (for want of better word). I’ve put some flowers nearby but am worried these brash garden centre daisies might contain hidden poisons in the form of insecticides and fungicides – might have to rip them out??

Have planted organic peat free variety of Michaelmas Daisies nearby instead but these due to lack of sunshine haven’t flowered yet and aren’t likely to in time for first butterfly due about 4 Sept !!!

There is some organic Loosestrife (peat free from Beth Chatto’s) nearby and buddleias about – I will move more pots of colourful flowers nearby….being very worried that this cold weather won’t be very welcoming.

…Was very worried that is, until remembering early this morning I’d read somewhere recently that to encourage butterflies into your garden this time of year, you can put out rotting fruit! They can feed off the sweetness, good as nectar for them which is their normal rocket fuel! Phew. So I found an damaged apple on my walk and put it I’ve hung a bowl along with peach remains on the nearby willow! Job done, hopefully.

Course there are other ways to encourage Butterflies – one v unpopular way is have cabbages The whites are v late to take advantage this year but here they are

Quite apart from boosting Large Whites numbers, these might end up as feed for wasps, believe it or not, which are also starting to be at risk and are fabulously important somehow in their own way, in the Eco system. I found that all hard to believe but have seen it with my own eyes. (As in one day a bunch of wasps arrived on my runner beans, and when they left all the caterpillars had disappeared!)

leave grasses long over winter

Although meadows /long grasses require one cut a year it doesn’t have to be in Autumn, it could be in Spring. You can cut some now and some in Spring. Reason being – and I was staggered to learn this – is that some caterpillars (moths as well as butterflies) use the long grass roots to overwinter in and as a food source. Do not cut off their supply!

Now is a good time I’ve decided to plant in more food sources – more the better as there are different plants for different species all helpfully listed by @KateBradbury in her wildlife gardening book. @ChrisPackham advises Cuckoo Flower to attract Orange Tips – so I’ve planted small clumps here which should flower next year. Honesty is another good one.

Honesty seed heads which have lost their covers and gone silvery at

I was frankly quite disappointed with my Honesty seedheads thinking they’d gone mouldy instead of silvery – until on closer inspection realised the outer seed cases both sides have to peel off in order to release the seeds. All seed heads good of course!

not just the butterflies

Of course moths need all our help too – this Mullein / Verbascum was v popular with the tiny Mullein moths this year . Their caterpillars were huge!! 2 inches long and quarter inch wide!

(BTW you can just see the hedgehog shelter in the background there by the waterbutt “)

The moths themselves are v pretty tiny little day flying moths brown with orange dots….No idea how they emerged from such huge caterpillars!

2x lifesize image of Mullein moth 1cm across looking autumnal

The Butterfly Garden is working

Peacock with both wings and sets of eyes showing

It’s not quite the green open space that I’d dreamed of but my little town garden has seen many more butterfly visitors this year…

May was too cold, June was quiet but July!

In July when the Buddleias finally came into flower, they were covered daily with 4 or 5 Peacocks and Red Admirals.

Were they the same 5 Peacocks and Red Admirals every day? I don’t know. But I did find out recently from a blog by the wonderful Chris Packham that when it rains, or gets cold and overcast, butterflies ‘snuggle down’ into the long grasses (if you have any) and this solved a mystery for me – I’d been wondering where do they appear from so quickly when the sun comes out again…?

But the best success has been this August – 3 Comma Caterpillars, which have now turned into 3 Comma chrysalises on the 3 nettles in the shady corner! To the lady from the RHS I can say it is definitely worth having a small patch of nettles not even in the full sun! I’ve been checking these nettles all summer and finally,after spotting some telltale black curled up leaves, holes and poops, saw this caterpillar which I needed help to ID:

Because as ButterflyConservation will tell you, it’s not just about encouraging butterflies with food sources they need, it’s also about growing the food that their caterpillars will enjoy/survive on. Very often different plant species altogether as butterflies need nectar but caterpillars need green stuff – and are very particular about which sort (down to only eating one or two certain species of plants.) Lucky for me Commas like nettles, as well as hops, I’ve just found out from the wonderful local branch.

Now I’d planted the nettles right next to the shed, along with some Michaelmas daisies for the last Peacocks of the season to feed off before laying their eggs on the nettles and then taking shelter in the shed right next to them – as per Butterfly Conservations suggestion. But it’s been Commas who arrived and nested there – and I didn’t even see them.

For next year, I’ve planted more Cuckoo flower – this time in amongst the long grasses and Teasels to try and attract more Orange Tips to nest here, as their young need brassica type plants, of which cuckoo grass is one…

Only saw one Orange Tip here this year. There aren’t many species around here but they are fabulous. Down the road in the new local park (so new it hasn’t been opened for the last three years) there is a thriving colony of Meadow Browns. I’ve seen skippers and Gatekeepers – and one or two have made it here too. Now at last the whites are laying on the few cabbages I grow especially for them . It’s taken the all summer – numbers must be down.

There’s a growing body of research which states that noticing the wildlife around us helps us humans connect with Nature. And the more people connect with Nature the better they feel, in themselves.. And the better we feel, the more interested we might become in preserving and encouraging wildlife and helping it to survive. Ironically, in our gardens this means surviving all the pesticides, insecticides and poisons we gardeners have traditionally thrown at it, in order to ‘garden’ – NOOOOO! It’s got to stop.

When I first moved here, 3 years ago, the whole space was covered in weed inhibiting black plastic. Having removed all of that, the small space is thrumming with insects (so that black stuff wasn’t just suppressing the weeds, but all manner of life.) Insects can recover from the 70% decline over the last 60 years, and quite quickly, if given the space to do so. Butterflies are just one of those declining species, but arguably for me at least the most beautiful. It’s such a pleasure and a privilege to have a few visit this small enclosed space.

“We do what we can”

Since mentioning in my last blog this government’s allowing lowering of food standards (since break with EU) meaning such awful stuff as chlorinated (and diseased) chicken about to be made available for sale from non European countries (such as USA) I’d like to redress the balance a bit…

Despite our Govt’s deliberate failure to protect our food standards and our countryside (with #HS2 and many awful “developments” destroying precious green spaces unnecessarily for housing) and despite big “pharma” business holding sway here as well as overseas – well despite all of that there is a huge groundswell I’m aware of (and I hope you’re aware of too) here and across the pond with many dedicated farmers practising sustainable and wildlife friendly farming agroforestry (without getting subsidies), cooperatives producing organically produced food and gardeners gardening organically too.

Am not sure if these forces pitted together – ‘us against them’ would ever mean big business or corrupt governance can ever be totally beaten – but the good fact is that this green, climate change combatting carbon footprint reducing and wildlife friendly movement is happening anyway…

Even tho in other places wildfires rage, rainforests are being torn down and million year old species are being made extinct – by humans. (Got to wonder if humans won’t make ourselves extinct at the rate we’re going?)

Still right now gardeners have a choice and can choose #peatfree compost reducing their carbon footprint (battling big businesses here and in Ireland which will surely lobby for the complete ban to be delayed) Only consumer forces will help win this battle. So it’s a useful one to join.

Not only can we choose this with help from @dogwooddays_nic ‘s wonderful #peatfree nursery list https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1X5D6mm_BDQrNqiUv2-BcWSKZPzALwBHq&usp=sharing

But also by choosing organically produced (and plastic free!) plants!

Not from many commercial, royal or even privately run garden centres though, as I’ve discovered to my cost. Even reputable companies “doing what they can” are condoning undeclared use of fungicides and pesticides which mean the #beefriendly plants are no such thing at all. They could be killing off insect biodiversity.

Now this is a bit of a blow – especially this very week having been tempted back to those very local garden centres instead of ordering peatfree etc online….Ouch.

One promised that it doesn’t use chemicals and does it’s only propagation totally insecticide and fungicide free (just not completely peatfree).

I can explain – having been lucky enough to get to see Sissinghurst (famous and truly fabulous White Garden, even in the gloom)

And Great Dixter nearby – truly organic with its fantastic nursery: and

Had to come home by train so was not able to bring beautifully propagated plants from there. I got desperate to see and buy! More colour and buddleias for my garden after seeing those colourful beautiful places. But there are no peatfree nurseries near me here … I could have ordered online, and Great Dixter has a catalogue… but didn’t and in a moment of weakness thereby failed! I do hope my #wildgarden and the insect populations there won’t suffer. You can’t be too careful!

But you can do better than me!

Here is the research into “bee friendly” flowers by Sussex Uni Prof Dave Goulson http://www.sussex.ac.uk/lifesci/goulsonlab/blog/bee-friendly-flowers

Wildlife Gardening

Wildlife Gardening sounds like a bit of an oxymoron doesn’t it? As in if it’s not wild then it’s gardened – gardening can’t be wild.

However as any gardener will know, gardening is as much about what you take out as what you put in, in terms of plants. Lots of work carefully removing flopped over long grasses (minding the froglets to be found there).

Tearing up grasses by hand is hard work but fun. There’s not often a grass out of place in my little patch! (And no need for moving, while simulating I hope at least, grasses being eaten by goats etc!)

And then I choose to leave and let grow some fairly large ‘weeds’ like Rosebay Willow herb because they remind me of my childhood and I love their pink flowers. As do the insects!

Thankfully I have to report a huge resurgence of insect populations of all sorts here since moving in and gardening in this way. (Bees, flies, hoverflies, wasps, moths pretending to be hoverflies pretending to be wasps or bees!) But I must remove the seedheads in order not to alarm the neighbours who live at close quarters here. It’s a complicated business!

But nothing compared to the complexity of the ecosystems at work in nature. Though I hate slugs and seeing them on my fave plants, am becoming much more aware now of how they do their part removing waste (even other animals’ poops) and so I mustn’t knock them.

After all we humans are appalling at removing and processing our own waste – both natural and chemical, let alone our ridiculously huge and tragic plastic waste – now imported from this small country (UK) to other countries (who can’t cope with it either). Thanks to this Govt also – our raw sewage is being allowed to pollute most if not ALL of our rivers, as I was appalled to learn via @GeorgeMonbiot’s @rivercide_live documentary. Even worse chicken ‘factories’ are literally flooding the water tables with what is essentially poisonous chicken crap, and this is killing off all life in our rivers too.

Note to self – eat less supermarket chicken! God only knows what happens when this Govt allows in already poisoned chlorinated diseased chicken for us to eat…

These are sorry times indeed. As they get worse with Covid, I wouldn’t say I garden more frantically – but I am trying to focus in on what I can do here and now to combat the destruction of habitat all around us (what with overbuilding, unnecessary railways like HS2 etc etc).

Clearing out and pruning branches of overgrowing shrubs and wisteria is endlessly therapeutic! As is deadheading roses. Talking of roses, I have a new one, take a look at this:

No, it’s not a single dog type rose (like I should get for insects to access more easily) but it smells heavenly and again takes me back – to the 70’s (happier more innocent days, just getting over nuclear destruction fears rather than facing full on climate calamity as we do now!). Growing it 70’s style amongst the Teasels and dried grasses – do love this time of year with golden light and long dried golden swaths.

But I digress! Mean to say, though chopping and cutting back is calming, finding new discoveries of wild things making their home here, well that’s just wildly exciting! Or sometimes a huge relief – to see another baby Newt (or Eft, sorry) for example after a long period of seeing none (where do they all go??). And to have a hedgehog to stay under the baking tray roofed shelter I built for it, well that’s just wonderful Nothing beats that sense of privilege for this space to be chosen as habitat by wild things….

Connectivity

So haven’t seen any Newts for a while – certainly none I could get a shot of – or so I thought…

Haven’t managed to ID the Newts that I have seen here either – they could either be Smooth or Palmate? Certainly not Greater Crested although they do still remind me of small dragons…Definitely brown and I think orange and dotty underneath, though I don’t often see their undersides. G has never seen one here at all! Despite the water being so clear in our square pond lately. I have seen a largish brown definite newt shape at the bottom relatively recently – it’s not a deep pond. It’s incredible how once they spot you, or sense they’ve been spotted, they know how to merge with their background, before your very eyes! Either moving slowly under cover or just sinking further down, til they’ve disappeared…

Well as I was saying, not many sightings lately, here or anywhere else. Haven’t been getting out much!

Then yesterday, right at the steep edge of the square pond there was a small what I thought was fish like creature, with wings if that makes sense. You can just about make out the “wings” (I’m sure there’s a proper word for them) in the photo above – which was taken as the creature started its disappearing act. (It got completely under the pebble seconds later)

So now I got to thinking. What if this is a baby Newt!? As per previous blog, I think I saw mating activity back in Feb/March. So it could be, right here! In that case if so, then I had actually already seen several of these creatures at the pond at Rousham Park. Blithely telling other visitors “No, no Newts here!” But they could have been. A small amount of internet research shows that 2″ long fish like creatures with “wings” and “forearms” or “external gills” and “front legs” is exactly what baby Newts look like.

In which case, how exciting.

You may be wondering where connectivity comes into it… Well in two ways for me, really.

Staring into the limpid waters it’s always astonishing to realise you’re seeing a fantastical creature that is, in some way or other, looking back at you – or aware of your presence at any rate. In this case aware enough to slide away…
Connecting with other people is also a thing I’m craving still – after Lockdown. And not just people in general but people who are as interested as I am in the odd Newt appearance! There’s TV presenters who’d like to see Newts in their pond, those people I met at the very posh Rousham pond and somebody else I’ve encountered on social media – an out and out Naturalist recovering from an op in hospital – for whom this Newt is a bit of a helpful diversion!

Talk about the “feel good factor”. I’m catching up with latest University of Derby research behind the #30DaysWild Wildlife Trust campaign, which shows that connecting with Nature is good for one’s soul – or sense of well-being and purpose to put it slightly more scientifically. All I can say is – it sure is!

Rousham Park pond (probably full of baby Newts)

Call of the Wild (rewrite)

Call of the Wild (by Annie Macdonald livingthewildlife.garden)

Isn’t it strange that it’s really only when you give up on things, completely and utterly, that they happen? I find that it’s like that with trying to connect with Nature, and things emerging from the garden – plants that you thought had died sending up shoots when you least expect it, or the Robin that only briefly appeared a while back, now being a regular visitor….

It’s also weird how sometimes you have to listen to that inner sense – even if it makes no sense. So it was one evening when I felt a distinct call to go look in the square pond, the one right outside the kitchen door. (Not the ‘wildlife pond’ specially dug into the lawn this year for wild things!) I had long given up on this square pond, it being so murky and hosting no visible life except snails. To the point of wondering whether to clear it out and start again.

But this evening in question, peering into the dark water in the half light I saw what I thought was the curl of a fallen leaf. And then it moved! I followed the shape around to find it was attached to a body, a distinctly dragon shape body if in miniature. A Newt!

As usual it had taken my brain a while to compute what I’d seen. Like the time a year or two ago when I saw, coming out of the corner of the same pond (which then had tadpoles and frogs) what I thought was a frog’s nose but the body kept coming straight out and along and along – and I realised it had a tail….and was astonished!

So this time I was so delighted that the next morning 6am I was there again, looking, and so was the Newt! Same thing a curl of a tail…The following morning I couldn’t believe my eyes, 4 Newts! This was early March…and quite cold.

I know now that that might have been mating season for them. Then when I found that out, I still worried there were not enough leaves for their eggs to be curled up in. But the Newts knew what they were doing, the frondy leaves would be fine.

Or so I’m hoping! Although I haven’t spotted the adults – lesser spotted they were I think – again, I am touched forever that they were there (and that somehow I knew to go look). And am hopeful baby newts might be on their way.

Despite the Mallard Duck and and Drake coming for a surprise visit – for a bath and munch of the green stuff (not duckweed). Well it was a surprise to me, I think they’d been before judging by the devastation! Which unfairly I’d blamed on Mrs Backbird. The ducks left me with a bit of a quandry – how much do you step in? I lured them away with a tiny bit of bread and put wire mesh down over the ‘wildlife pond’ – to protect the tadpoles in there…

And apparently tadpoles or frogs eat newts eggs or is newts that eat tadpoles? – or both? – (so it’s lucky they might be in different ponds). Thankfully I can’t take really any further action. I’ll just have to let things take their course and see what I can see! And learn what I can. Being very glad of the wild things that live right outside my back door.

Nature knows best

Recently after a lovely tweet exchange on social media about the benefits of #ForestBathing, I thought I better give it a go in the garden. It’s been pretty cold in the UK hasn’t it? Not exactly optimum conditions for this, especially in the early morning frosty air. This was never likely to be that relaxing!

Still, I decided to stand under the largest tree at the end of the garden, a large silver birch, hoping for some phytoncide fall out (a good relaxing thing, these natural mood enhancing chemicals that trees release or so I’ve heard. It makes sense, when you think how calming sitting under a tree actually is).

Soon my attention was caught by one lonely if busy Bluetit, who appeared to be eating something on the branch furthest away from me. It could have been buds, or bugs on the buds this tree not yet being in leaf. (Another reason why hoping for phytoncides was perhaps a little ambitious on my part?)

Next thing I knew, this Bluetit had apparently had enough of me looking up (although I do my best to feed them all year round of course) and so took up a position on the branch right over my head – and – wait for it – yes – pooped right above me! I saw it! Luckily, or unluckily, depending on your point of view, the poop missed. But it sure taught me a lesson! Or rather that little tiny bird did!

Later this week another bird, or pair rather, of very fine Mallards had a similar, if more quandry inducing effect. The female arrived first and promptly climbed into my original square pond which was made 3 years ago, inside the walls built for a water feature, that’s long since been dismantled. She made herself quite at home.

I was worried however, since I’m now convinced the Newts had been mating there previously and now I realise they could have laid eggs in the pond weed. (Although it didn’t have leaves as such, the fronds would have been shelter enough). On close inspection once the duck got out, there’s not much weed left- Oh NO!

Then she made a move on the lavender bed – OK – and then I realised the Drake was around too! Actually sitting on the high fence and watching proceedings. She wanted to climb in the new pond, I tried to head her off (to protect the tadpoles in there). But he got in as well! What a mess they made of my carefully selected pond plants. Again! I now know they must have been the culprits the first time I came home to shredded and overturned pond plant pots and general mayhem / mudded waters….

Now here’s the thing – the dilemma. Do Ducks count as wildlife? Of course! who is the pond for? All wildlife to use – or that was the dream. Hedgehogs, foxes, ducks??? Well I can tell you that their making a meal, a quick ducky dinner of my prize (oxygenating) pond weed did not over balance my need to protect the little things living in the pond, the tadpoles.

Next thing I was shooing them away, by distracting them with bits of bread – how naughty! And quickly laying down a large-ish sheet of wire square netting that handily I had lying at the back of the shed! That will stay in place til they fledge, or whatever it’s called that tadpoles do – namely turn into the cutest tiniest of little frogs, hopefully, after a long, long summer! It’s only mid April now…

Call of the Wild

You know how sometimes it’s only when you give up, really completely give up all hope of something, that it happens?

That’s what it was like seeing those newts recently. I’d last spotted one at the edge of my pond, a whole couple of years ago and that was a great surprise. First of all I saw the nose and face moving from behind a pebble, and then the front legs…I was thinking this is one of the frogs ( hatched from the tadpoles previously that year). But the body, well it kept coming…until I realised it had a long tail…All over in a few seconds, I couldn’t quite believe what I was seeing – or thinking: “It must be a newt!”

I’d put down a little wood pile as soon as I got to this garden three years ago, to attract or shelter newts but hadn’t seen any sign (although the next door neighbours said they ‘had’ newts in their pond). However I’ve since learnt that putting this woodpile under the honeysuckle was perhaps not the best idea, as frogs at least can be poisoned by honeysuckle. I adore honeysuckle and couldn’t bear to give it up since I love the scent and once it grows, I’m hoping the sparrows will love it too. This honeysuckle staying where it was, near the pond, was part of the reason I’d given up any future sightings of newts and frogs alike there. And it was another reason for digging a new wildlife pond early this year, in a different spot, away from such a dangerous plant.

I can’t explain why recently one evening in my kitchen about to prepare supper, I felt impelled just before dusk to go outside and look in the pond. The original pond. So murky and green and empty of movement after all that frost and ice in February that I’d completely given up on seeing any interesting life in it. Or more importantly on it being a useful habitat at all, for anything except a vastly reduced amount of snails. I was wondering about draining it and starting again.

Staring into the dark waters I saw a curled shaped that at first I thought was a leaf, fallen in. I was thinking about removing it (as you do with excess vegetation) when it moved, curled more. Again I couldn’t quite make out what I was seeing. But I followed the curled leaf shape along to the rest of the body….which turned out to be a miniature dragon shape in front of my eyes. At once so tiny yet so fabulous, like something out of a story book for children. Something I couldn’t quite believe, but wanted to!

I rushed indoors to tell my husband and grab my camera phone – but of course it had gone. Leaving me wondering…The next morning I was awake early and despite the cold, couldn’t resist another peek in the pond. It’s right outside my kitchen door, across the decking. There I saw the same shape again, with a few dots on the back! I didn’t even try to get a photo this time, just kept still, watching, looking. Entranced. I hadn’t been imagining things! Here he (or she) was, slowly climbing over a submerged pot, so I could really see how he moved. (Last year I thought I saw something similar but then couldn’t really be sure. Now I was certain. And overjoyed!)

What is that dopamine hit we get on espying and feeling seen by a natural, wild thing? Tolerated even for a little while? I don’t know the exact chemistry, but the feeling is amazing.

Imagine my pleasure the next day, nearly my birthday, on seeing not one, or two but FOUR newts, slightly tangled and slowly moving. I’ve looked up since that this is newt mating time – maybe that’s what was going on – but sadly there are no leaved plants in that pond for the females to attach and wrap eggs in. (Situation being remedied with some Frogbit on order right now). Still no photo – it was so murky. Since then the water has cleared to crystal clear, and I’ve made no sightings of them. Just to my immense surprise the next day, a large frog! Sitting under the water’s surface quietly for a quite a while, then later poking his nostrils out.

Here is my newt drawing, showing how when climbing the body curves one way and the feet (and or hands!) on the one side come closer and on the other reach wider…The tail is too long, I’m pretty sure. I did this from memory. (Oh and a photo of the handsome frog, just in case you don’t believe me!)

Rewilding (myself)

Yesterday was Global #Rewilding Day and I’m so glad (relieved and joyful) personally that this has caught on, that somebody / some people even thought of it in the first place: WAY TO GO!

Yesterday was officially the first day of Spring and the Spring Equinox – but today 21st March will always be first day of Spring for me (as it’s my birthday)

I have been ruminating on what it means for me, rewilding, especially having read @simonbarneswild brilliant book Rewild Yourself. This gives me hope that my little and very personal approach might make a difference, even if I can only affect my own surroundings….Lucky enough to be able to “own” a patch of earth, I’m determined to find out who or what I’m sharing it with.

This means for me following the birdsong when I go for a walk or at home, listening…Intuiting….Responding to as if a call.

This week am unbelievably lucky (as in if you’d told me last week I would not have believed you) on responing to one such call, to go look to in my murky first pond. So murky after that Siberian snap with 2″ thick ice that I didn’t think anything had survived….imagine my surprise – could hardly believe my eyes as first I spotted a moving curl which turned out to be a tail belonging to the body of one those incredible mini spotted dragons! A Newt! In my murky pond! And the next day, FOUR Newts…..

Not in the new Wildlife pond I’ve been writing about – but who’s counting/ name calling /specifying who should live where?? No newts on show here, intermittent sightings only (though did see one nose this morning 🙂 Am hoping the new Hornwort is helping clear the water and there are a few more snails.

Radio 3 is going for it Nature wise this morning, I’m so glad! @RSPB Snettisham oh wow. Thing is the closer we can all come and feel like we are close to nature, the more wonderful it becomes and perhaps the more we can do to pull back, and allow Nature and wildlife the space, freedom (from poison and plastic) it needs and deserves, having given us life and a space to live in the first place…on this precious Earth.

So here’s the Wildlife pond!

Very much work in progress – but the daffodils popped up where I’d planted them last year. I’ve put in a few additions such as the primula and wild primroses around the edge. There are some more pond plants too to be potted in (had a real disaster with that last time round, the ‘coir compost’ just went everywhere in the water!) So am steeling myself for completing that process more effectively. For marginals I have Cuckoo Flower (I think) and that wonderful Scirpus Cernus or Fibre Optic Plant (just had to look that up!). And then I’ve got some Oxygenators in there too – it’s great how much you can learn off the telly. (I’m finding Together TV showing Garden Rescue reruns is great at the mo!). I’ve learnt such a lot and benefit from watching those confident gardeners chucking in the bunches of green weighted oxygenators!

I think I’ve got Hornwort and Egeria Densa – So I’ll have to watch that one…

But the really exciting thing is, and I know I shouldn’t have, is that I have some frogspawn which my neighbour gave me over the fence! So it hasn’t come from too far away – and hopefully won’t be too put out. I think my neighbours saw my efforts to get this pond in in time for the local wildlife and frogs especially to use it and felt pity for me and were willing to share! It has gone a bit green and alganeous looking, so am not quite sure what’s happened there.

But it is very exciting, to think we may have more tadpoles – anxious making though it is watching over them and hoping some make it to be mini frogs – which are so, so cute.

I might have to order some more plants, some Frogbit and some other things they like to eat…