My little wildlife garden in progress. 🌱🌺🌻🏵🌼🌷🏵🌱

I thought I would share the pictures I have taken of my garden using my new SLR camera. 📸📷I live with my parents in a private letting council association house. I moved back in with my parents after finishing university in April 2018.When moving back in I asked whether the garden could be my domain so my mum happily agreed. I had bought her some bee friendly plants when I was younger that she had planted and since then she had let it get somewhat out of control.Our garden isn’t very big so I wanted to make it beneficial to wildlife as well as enjoyable for us.As you go out our back door our garden is concrete slabs, it is split into two sides with concrete stairs in between and as you reach the top of the stairs we have grass on the right hand side and concrete and a washing line to the left. The only soil we have for plants is near the washing line and via a raised bed.

I started the garden by clearing a lot of the weeds and grass that had grown in underneath the fence from the neighbours on the other side behind the massive fence, I kept all the bee friendly flowers I had given my mum when I was a teenager, i kept the buddleia which is in the corner which the birds like to hide and nest in (especially the sparrows) and I cleared the weeds and a dead Bush from the little patch of soil near the washing line- this was then my space to fill.Before planting I spent some time loosening the soil as we have clay soil, and they started off by planting wildflower seeds and other bee friendly seed mixes.I then spent some time thinking about exactly what plants I wanted in my garden and through research I have found that the best wildlife gardens have native wildflowers all bee friendly but also some non-native flowers typically from the northern hemisphere as they are the best mixed in with our native species. I wanted a variety of colours and shapes and I also wanted the flowers to emerge spring through to Autumn to ensure the bees have forage almost all year around. I also wanted to make sure that there were flowers for both long tongued bees and short tongued bees, long tongued bees like tubular flowers and short tongue bees like simple flowers where the nectar and pollen is easily accessible.After putting the wildflower mixes in and letting them settle for 3 to 4 weeks I then started putting in the larger plants.Near the back of the fence I wanted climbing plants, there was already a jasmine and honeysuckle on either side so there was a patch in the middle between these two of the fence that I want covering up, I have 3 trellises in total for these plants.The raised bed we have in the garden used to be held up using logs which looks quite nice however, some of the logs got loose a few years ago so the housing association fixed it by placing an ugly concrete wall in front of the logs it is a pale grey and we’ve never liked it- so at the forefront of the raised bed I’ve chosen flowers that will grow over it and hopefully making it less ugly to look at.Then the middle of the raised bed I have planted a mixture of shrubs flowers and herbs including bloody sage time bergamot, rosemary and lavender.On the patch of soil near the washing line I have planted a big lavender bush as I thought this is make our washing smell amazing and I have planted some low-lying flowers in between where the Bluebells grow each spring as well as tarragon and some other herbs.So that have been lots of changes in our garden, my mum was reluctant at first but now the flowers are in and they are doing so well she is now getting excited for summer and is getting excited thinking about how they are going to grow and fill the raised bed and look absolutely beautiful, be enjoyable to look at and how much wildlife it will attract including bees, butterflies and moths.What I would like to do next is:

• Put in some bird feeders and nesting boxes.
• Put in a bat box.
• Make a frog habitat where we regularly see frogs.
• Buy some fruit and vegetables.
• Paint the fence and have hanging plant pots.
• Paint the concrete wall near the raised bed.
• Have a compost bin.
• Have a water butt.
• Bee bath.
• Bird bath.
• Butterfly house.
• Ladybug house.
• Toad house.

Then my wildlife garden shall be complete.

Anyway, I hope you like the pictures.

Until next time.Faye xxx

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