Create mini-habitats for birds, mammals and bugs

This weekend’s RSPB #homesfornature challenge sees us trying to create mini-habitats for birds, mammals and bugs.

RSPBIn previous weeks we have made a wildlife pond, a hedgehog home, a beetle bucket as part of the #homesfornature campaign.  We’ve made our own bird feeder to attract more birds into the garden too.  This week we’ve been looking at the plants in the garden – how do we attract more nature into the garden?

We are lucky in the fact we have very mature trees behind our back fence, full of birds all year round.  I love the spring time when you can hear the young calling out to their parents for food.

We installed an insect hotel earlier in the year, it seems to be very popular with spiders, hopefully we might get ladybirds checking in over winter.

We’ve been adding some more plants to the garden throughout the year to hopefully attract more visitors over the coming years.  I’m really conscious that our bees are in decline and hope that our new lavender will attract the bees.  We’ve planted a second Buddleia to attract more butterflies.

Hopefully, over the coming months, we’ll start to reap the rewards of our efforts this year – frogs (how I hope for frogs!!), more beetles, ladybirds and other bugs, hedgehogs, bees,  and so on.

Now I know that snails are supposed to be a gardeners nightmare, but we, or should I say, my son, have a bit of a soft spot for snails.  We go on snail hunts when we are out and about and he studies them in great detail in our garden.

www.over40andamumtoone.com Snails, Create mini-habitats for birds, mammals and bugs
www.over40andamumtoone.com Snails

We have Honeysuckle in a couple of spots in the garden and have added two different Clematis, which flower at different times, a Jasmine and a Passionflower – hopefully, they will establish by next year to thrill the bees and give the birds some extra cover.  We have Ivy climbing all over our back fence – the birds love it as they can pick berries in the winter and often hide within the many tendrils.

We’re doing our best to create mini-habitats for birds, mammals and bugs.

 

2 thoughts on “Create mini-habitats for birds, mammals and bugs

  1. I’m starting to get more plants in now, too, so have just added more clematis and honeysuckle, too, have lavender cuttings on the go, and we have a gorgeous, huge buddleia already. We’ve landscaping to do over the next few weeks that should then make room for our wildlife garden area, with our mini-beasts hotel, which Boo is really excited about making. We’ll be looking back on your posts when that time comes for lots of inspiration 🙂 Not sure we’ll be encouraging snails, though, with all the new plants I’ve been getting recently..!

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