These Wild Animals Can Help Guard Your Garden

The growing season might be in full swing, but there are still ways to upgrade your garden game. From keeping out unwanted pests (or pets) to building your own customized trellising and irrigation—it’s time to make your beds work smarter, not harder. We’ve got five ways to customize your planters this summer that will not only make things look fantastic, but will take your growing capabilities to the next level. Whether you choose to tackle them all or just add one to your list of weekend to-dos, I promise it will be a noticeable refresh with rewarding results. 

Some Tips for Encouraging wildlife into your garden:

Every gardener wants to have better plants and flowers, but, sometimes we just need to get to the root of the matter so to speak. There is nothing more satisfying than a deep rich loamy soil. Unfortunately, unless you are very luck, you are unlikely to inherit such a soil. Nevertheless it is definitely worth investing the time and energy to improve your soil. Over time looking after your soil will pay dividends.

Sometimes as gardeners, we place all the emphasis on plants. However, a few well positioned ornaments and focal points can heighten the interest and drama within a garden.

Autumn may seem a strange time to start a gardening business but it is the time to focus on what you want to do. Get all your ducks (or seedlings) in a row and ensure you have the detail sorted and with that I include enough cash to see you through and chosen customer groups. How to Start Your Own Gardening Business An Insider Guide to Setting Yourself Up as a Professional Gardener is a useful tutorial if you want to set up a gardening business. I recommend you consider your aspirations and limitations carefully and either set up a ‘Life Style business’ or consider becoming a qualified, professional career gardener.

Attracting wildlife into your garden can help deal with types of pests and increase the diversity of life in the garden. Some methods for increasing wildlife are quite easy.

As gardeners mature they enter a purple patch in their life and potentially in the garden. Some of the best plants with purple or coppery coloured leaves take several years to mature like the notional gardener. Amongst the favourites must be the copper beech and the many Acers with reddish leaves.

‘Oh the old bamboo the old bamboo never-ever bother with the old bamboo’ That song reminds me to weed out the poor and damaged canes I have left over from previous seasons. Away with split canes that snag and frustrate and may carry disease.

A: As much as wild ivy provides a very important habitat for birds and insects, and the arboreal form (the older, shrubby growth which produces flowers), and is a really valuable source of nectar, it can also be problematic in established gardens where it can damage built structures as well as some established, older trees such as your apple tree. With the latter, very heavy ivy growth can eventually cause death by overburdening the tree’s leafy canopy, which in turn can result in (a) broken branches, leading to an increased risk of disease and (b) destabilising of the tree’s root system, increasing the risk of it falling in a storm. Very heavy ivy growth in the canopy of a fruit tree can also reduce the amount of light needed for healthy growth, interfere with blossom set and slow down ripening of the fruit.

In case you hadn’t noticed, weeds are having a bit of a moment, and have been for some time. They were stars of the show at Chelsea this year and are increasingly being appreciated for their up-until-now-overlooked ornamental value. They are also living proof that our attitudes to gardens – who they are for and how they should look — are shifting. Gardens have always been a mirror to society, and now more than ever we see the pressing issues of our time reflected in how we think about them. We are no longer creating gardens solely for our enjoyment, but for the birds and the bees too. We are also being much more mindful about resource management, selecting plants and materials which will have the lightest footprint, requiring the least intervention. Weeds (whatever that term means) are the perfect solution. Incredibly well adapted to their environment, they will need little or no nurture to get established and thrive. And because they’re native, they support a huge range of insects and invertebrates who have evolved alongside them.

In July 2022, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) drew attention to North America’s migrating monarchs by adding them to their ICUN Red List of Threatened Species. In the United States, the more immediate plight of other threatened and endangered species has precluded the monarchs’ inclusion on the Endangered Species List. However, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service acknowledged that their place on this list is “warranted.” They mandated that the monarchs be reviewed annually as a potential candidate for inclusion. These incredible insects migrate 4000 miles every spring and fall and face immense dangers on this epic journey. What simple steps can you take to help monarchs as they travel past your home?

It is Spring! And I am so excited to get back into the landscape to clean and update my landscape beds. But, oddly, as excited as I am, I realize this month also consists of a lot of “hurry up and wait” due to our unpredictable weather.