Wilding your garden our green space

We dug out all the shrubs and gravel in the front garden about 18months ago and put down wild flower/grass meadow seed. Doesn't look as colourful as the council wildflower meadows, but it's certainly busy over the summer. Mow to 10cm throughout growing season but leave to flower over summer.

The rear back garden had a fence then a leylandii hedge. A tree took the fence down a couple of years ago so to fix the fence the leylandii had to go (thankfully). In its place we left a wild strip and put down some old birch logs. Now it's grasses and flowers and some self seeded trees, elder and rowan. The rear lawn gets mown about once a month now,or if we're due people over in the garden. Loads more flowers, insects and bees.

We've had to cut out our overgrown jungle, however we've consciously put back in things that encourage all sorts back to the garden.

This winter will see lots of new hawthorn, more heather, big grasses etc go back in too.

Plus of course 6 bird boxes of differing types and a hedgehog hoose.

I let the lawn grow enough for the clover to flower, then give the bees a week before I cut it.

Gradually replacing the stuff in the borders with more insect friendly versions

Other half did no mow may and will often mow around the clover every so often. The plants have been chosen to give the bees something at every point during the year and we do seem to have a disproportionate amount of purple.

Old Gü pudding dishes are filled with pebbles and rain water to give them a drink during dryer times as well.

Good idea Matt. Hubby will be making a hog house before end of summer. I'll just stand by and tell him where to place it :0)

Given out complete inability to grow veg due to repeated infestations of slugs, snails and caterpillars I think our garden does well enough for wildlife 🤣

Neither of our neighbours mow their grass consistently. And as a result the mares tail we thought we'd eradicated has come back too.

We keep our garden reasonably tidy but we also try to encourage as much wildlife as possible.

We’ve got hedge along the one side and front, we’re on the corner of a junction, so that inside and out and that requires maintenance in accordance with our tenancy agreement. Which in reality means three cuts a year. It’s got every type of hedging plant used anywhere and a few that nobody would use.

There’s also apple, pear, plum and cherry trees. An abundance of bee loving plants and the lawn is clover and dandelions. We’re planning to add a wild flower and flowering grasses area where the moss is taking over, don’t know how successful that will be.

I started a thread about , what turns out to be, a giant puffball mushroom growing in my “lawn”. If any one wants it before it spores then they are welcome to it. Apparently The Wife doesn’t want a giant fungal infection.

I'm a big fan of more wilding. Probably bang on about it a bit too much, to especially when we have a "what mower for 17 acres of lawn" thread. We've got few areas of garden with a mix of lawn and wild. Steadily increasing the wild bit. It's a fine line to keep out some of more aggressive plants that lead to a bit of mono culture but we're getting a good balance now. Lots of different grasses, heather, ferns, clover, wild flowers. Also have some nice mixed native hedgerow and a green roof and just put in a wildlife pond. Much better than a lawn. Getting some good wildlife in.

I prepared the centre part of our lawn last year, cut, raked and scarified.
Spread a wildflower mix for clay according to the instructions and tended it over the winter. Mowed in spring to give the plants other than grass a chance to get going and apart from the odd wildflower all we got was long grass. I mowed it all off last week and starting the raking and scarifying process again. I have fresh Rattle seed this time and plug plants that I have brought on.
Certainly had a lot of Dragonflies over the meadow and loads of small dark butterflies and tiny frogs. Plus a Deer that passes through the garden and deadheads the roses. According to Monty Don it takes years to establish a meadow so here is looking forward to next years effort.
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We had a go at a wildflower border this year.

It wasn’t quite as successful as I’d hoped as it became overgrown with 1.5m tall purple flowers which didn’t bloom for all that long. Next year’s plan involves wildflower plugs rather than growing from seed, and I think a lavender.

Haven't gone for meadow lawn yet, but we do keep adding more bee-friendly plants (lots of nectar, differing flowering seasons) and making sure there is water available for the birds and bigger visitors. We've had bees nest (bumbles and leaf cutter) and make sure we don't disturb them. And good dense vegetation although the local cats make me think there are few nesting opportunities within our garden. The next things will probably be a small pond and bigger veg patch. We've had a hedgehog but no evidence recently but we get foxes and a badger. Could really do with the hedgehog as we have so many snails and slugs they keep eating the best plants (salvias, sunflowers seem to be favourites).

Yup. I mow the edges to keep the neighbours happy and leave the middle. If you look closely you'll see and little oak, a maple and some ash which may create a mini forest one day. The peaches have been half picked to make jam. I'm hoping the reaminder will be nice enough to eat soon.

It's so heartening to know that many of us are really doing something. If we can join up all these little plots, then there's hope.

Last week I took my mum for a walk around a housing estate. Nearly all the gardens were immaculate, some very pretty, some boring and just green, it was very noticeable the lack of bees and insects. We need to 'let go' in the UK and let nature in. It all takes time.

Left my rear grass till today to cut. Was a good 18/20 inches tall.

The wildlife* still resides in the hedge and the more kept front garden(grass kept till the clover flowers -the wild roses , fruit trees and clematis) didn't note any increase in activity in the long grass other than it swamping the wild flowers.

So we can achieve similar results without the garden looking like we don't live here anymore

*Birds (mostly sparrows/tits but some crows and red kites quite regularly) , pollinators , foxes, hedgehogs , caterpillars slugs and snails etc . The frogs live in the waterway running down the back of the hedge. The sheep and horses live over the road.

What I'd like to see is the council not blanket cutting down the road verges..... Easy gains there. I replanted mine last year with low grow wild flowers at fair expense and the ****ing council came along about 2 weeks ago and leveled it leaving a mess ...-was 6 inches tall not blocking any sight lines. How ever on the plus side looks like his blade found all the rocks in the edge.

What I’d like to see is the council not blanket cutting down the road verges

I’d settle for them not nuking the verges with glyphosate, which leads neatly on to this petition.

I did a FOI on this a while ago; it turned out that the council were spending half a million pounds a year to starve bees.

Yep, it’s taken nearly three years at one property I’m responsible for but by not cutting the grass crown is now less dense and new stuff has started seeding itself. In year one we cut two or three times. This year we won’t cut at all. Lots of moths, bees and insects. And this is in a semi urban environment.

We dug out our urban front lawn 6 years ago and planted a variety of fancy thistles and other flowers. I do a bit of weeding for aesthetics but try to let even those things flower before pulling them out. We cut it back once a year in winter.

then give the bees a week before I cut it.

I now have an image in my head of MCTD standing in their garden saying "oi, bees, you've got a week yeah?"

Lovely pic Mariner.

Neither of our neighbours mow their grass consistently. And as a result the mares tail we thought we’d eradicated has come back too.

You don’t live next to me do you?! We have Marestail, even after being under black plastic for 25+ years it has still come back now that we’ve uncovered it.

This was ours last year

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We’ve got a strip at the end of our garden that is about 25m x 5m that we are trying to turn in to a wild flower meadow. I think we need to do a bit more research on how to get the flowers to grow, last year was great but this year it’s mostly grass and very few flowers.

I’m going to cut it back in Autumn and again in spring, I didn’t do it this spring which I think might be where I went wrong?

last year was great but this year it’s mostly grass and very few flowers.

Maybe need some Yellow Rattle seeds?

I remember seeing something on spring watch last year perhaps about creating a wildlife garden and using native plants more. So I plants a load of native plant plugs and the impact has been amazing. The number of bumble bees this year has visibly increased along with birds. Seen a couple of fly catchers too.

One of the best plants has been teasels. Bees love them and then we get flocks of goldfinches in the winter feeding on them.

Yes yellow rattle is a must.
We partitioned our local council to stop cutting grass verges. Luckily they haven't cut along the new A555 this year due to a public petition, which has seen significant increases in wildlife - kestrels, buzzards, finches feeding from the seed heads, more insects.

I've mowed my lawn about 3 times this year, leaving a 3 metre x 1 metre stretch in the centre uncut. We've had more grasshopper, beetles and butterflies in that area, a gatekeeper being one that never would normally visit our garden.
This year even found red clover.

Wildlife pond is under construction. I've got some clumps of echinacea and echinops that the bees seem to love along with a lavender border. There's a wildflower patch under the buddleia that also attracts a good amount of wildlife. Lovely sitting in the sun watching all the activity.

Artificial grass seems to be the latest fad near me,that and paving/graveling over the front garden

Rewilding? Absolutely! No need to take that well-used mattress to the dump when it can be a haven for rodent life. Likewise the old telly with the smashed screen - perfect for wasps or ants to make a nest, so much better for wildlife than a new Oled.

I prepared the centre part of our lawn last year, cut, raked and scarified.
Spread a wildflower mix for clay according to the instructions and tended it over the winter. Mowed in spring to give the plants other than grass a chance to get going and apart from the odd wildflower all we got was long grass. I mowed it all off last week and starting the raking and scarifying process again. I have fresh Rattle seed this time and plug plants that I have brought on.

Most issues like this will be due to excess nutrients, mainly Nitrogen in the soil. A few years of allowing to grow cutting back hard, over and over and crucially removing clippings will help if you want to play the long game. Stripping turf before sowing will also help. Most the council roadside 'meadow' stuff will be mainly cornfield annual type mixes which will cope better with higher nutrient levels.

Yellow rattle has been shown to help knock back the dominance of grasses due to it being selectively parasitic on grasses but it also needs low nutrient levels to grow in the first place so an excess of hope placed on it helping allowing flower establishment is misplaced IMO. Carbon addition can help lower soil nutrients, using saw dust can help although you need to make sure it was untreated wood as you want soil fungi to grow in the place of bacteria.

We’re doing this as much out of practical necessity, we live next to a nature reserve with a herd of wild red deer who roam freely and see anything growing as food. They stand along our wall each evening and look longingly at our newly seeded lawn - in the morning we have lots of hoof-prints and pulled-out tufts. Our boundary along one side is a stone wall and home to frogs, toads and newts. Along the wall was piled-up some dead trees and loads of brash - we’ve cleared it away from the wall to try and control the bracken, but left the brash and dead trees piled up as the birds and the hedgehogs like it. We have put deer fence around a couple of areas as we are planning to grow our own produce, but most of it will be left to grow naturally. We have at least 4 species of orchid on the nature reserve and trying to create the right conditions for them to grow in our garden. We have some bird feeders and came down to find one in pieces on the floor - turns out deer like sunflower seeds too. I’ve just got a salvaged plastic mussel float that I’m going to cut in half - one side to make a hedgehog house and the other a small wildlife pond.

We left the top bit of our garden to go long. Just about finished dealing with it - 7 hours cutting it, 7 hours raking it, god knows how many hours making 40 bales of hay with a wooden contraption I knocked up.

I am now less sold on having a wild flower garden!

If you wee into a bottle and mix it 1 part wee to 9 parts water in a watering can, then water your lawn...that got your attention...it turns to clover, it also grows like you never seen, wee is the best nitrogen/phosphate mix you can get, once past the shock and horror the benefits are pretty impressive, tomatoes and lawns especially.

I let my lawn grow then cut around the edges and a circle of wild bit at one end, looked rather designery, all clover(yes I did) but after the flowers it went brown, so cut it and did it over with a different pattern, hipster patterned lawn is the new..er..lawn.

Clover doesn't need nitrogen, it can fix its own

didn’t note any increase in activity in the long grass other than it swamping the wild flowers.

It takes some time (a couple of years) before the grass “crown” thins sufficiently for wildflowers to find space. We helped this along in a few places we removed the grass and seeded the ground with various mixes. In others we planted fully grown plants. But yeah it’s a bit of a compromise between neat and tidy and somewhat unkempt. Between us and Once the local church stopped dumping weed killer and let stuff grow up on their neighbouring grounds we’ve seen seen a marked increase in insects.

Well, in contrast to the above we haven't re Wilded in our recent garden renovation. It's a small plot and we need space to sit out and enjoy the outside so we extended our patio and reduced the lawn which is now about 4x3m. However we've planted a ton of flowers and we took care to put in species that will attract the bees and butterflies. We were a bit late with it though so hoping for a better show next year.

Clover doesn’t need nitrogen, it can fix its own

Well it likes it enough to carpet the entire lawn in a fortnight, it was a pretty remarkable transformation, for years I put Evergreen pellets on it and it was never great, two weeks after a couple of wee mix applications and it's the best lawn in the neighbourhood by a lush green margin, some other things have responded similarly, tomatoes have gone nuts, basil didn't like it and turned yellow, it's powerful enough to see visible effects surprisingly quickly.

Well it likes it enough to carpet the entire lawn in a fortnight

Correlation doesn't mean cause.

Yep, I did "No Mow May" and than carried on not mowing the lawn for June and most of July.

Clover flowers all over the place and the bumble bees (and a few honey bees) had a fine old time.

Will probably plant some lavender in the near future and we have some massive ragwort plants growing down the side of the house which are going to remain in place.

I was also letting a massive thistle grow on the strip of grass at the front of the house which forms the boundary between our house and next door.

Being in inverness the thistle was right at home.

Despite the grass being obviously ours (its in front of our house) the neighbours dad decided that that bit of grass needed tidying up and he cut down the thistle!

We made a tiny pond last summer and this year we have had Dragonflies in the garden for the first time. The Buddleia is getting huge and means at timed you cant walk in the garden without having a swarm of butterflies around you.
The 3.5month old Lab was a bit surprised when a giant Dragonfly did a lap of the kitchen.

dovebiker

Thanks for the tip about Cornfield mix. I will give that a try this year.

Clover doesn’t need nitrogen, it can fix its own

Well it likes it enough to carpet the entire lawn in a fortnight, it was a pretty remarkable transformation, for years I put Evergreen pellets on it and it was never great, two weeks after a couple of wee mix applications and it’s the best lawn in the neighbourhood

So you stopped putting fertiliser on it and the clover increased? I don't think pissing on it had much impact.

So you stopped putting fertiliser on it and the clover increased? I don’t think pissing on it had much impact.

Look it up.

It's used commercially in agriculture in parts of the US, the Aztecs were apparently the first to do it on a community level, it's not an unknown thing, just putting the same nitrogen and phosphates in that Miracle grow does.

Another thought that a friend had showed me.

He let a few vegetables bolt and flower, rather than pick everything. He's got some exotic looking flowers, amazing foliage and the wildlife love it. And it's onions, carrots, broccoli and rhubard..

Look it up.

I don't need to, it did not cause the clover to increase.

He let a few vegetables bolt and flower, rather than pick everything.

That's a great idea, also leave the flowering heads over winter to provide seed resources.

He let a few vegetables bolt and flower, rather than pick everything. He’s got some exotic looking flowers, amazing foliage and the wildlife love it. And it’s onions, carrots, broccoli and rhubard..

He wants to keep an eye on it, some quite aggressive plants there, could be rubhard with a vengeance. Ahem.

We've got a 5*10m patch that I strim once at the back end of the year (nowish really) also leave wide margins at the edge by the beck. Done it for three years now and starting to diversify quite nicely, going help it it with some seeds in spring but don't want to "overpower" the local stuff so will be sparing with it. The number of vole and field mouse "tracks" in it is quite astounding, loads of frogs and toads too. Been building hibernaculae bat and bird boxes with the kids too, really enjoying seeing the difference as it was just a bit of field with a hedge round it when we moved in. The side by side comparison with the bit we still mow (admittedly still not quite tennis court but pretty"rustic") is stark.

We too leave our veg to bolt.

The best thing that I found for bees are the raspberry bushes, when they flower the bees are all over.

Please be careful when strimming the longer grass areas, as many hedgehogs get injured or even killed.

I accidentally chopped off a frogs leg once, it was awful, so I now carefully check hedges and long grass areas before clipping, chopping, trimming, cutting or strimming anything where a creature may dwell or take refuge.

We aim to start a bee year with pulmonaria and snow drops, spring flowers follow, eg native cranesbill geranium, flowering fruits, wild flowers, clover, valeria, scabious, lavender, plenty of purple and yellow flowering plants, mostly the type with an open flower head, later buddleia, heather and verbena and all some of the examples we've planted in the garden.
I took out anything that wasn't helping the insects. The long grass seems to attract the beetles and give many smaller insects a resting place and refuge. One year I even had swallows and house martins flying low over the small lawn.

Every year I gather the fallen leaves and pop them under the hedge.
I've also planted another apple tree and a rowan.

I just wish the chap next door would stop using slug pellets.

I don’t need to, it did not cause the clover to increase.

Did, I put it down to the phosphorus and potassium in the wee mix, despite the nitrogen that you appear to think all consuming.

Join the wee revolution, embrace the piss.

I accidentally chopped off a frogs leg once

They survive it, I found one dragging a mouse trap, on closer inspection it had been dragging it about long enough to grow a bit of a leg back, like a new bit, not sure if they grow a whole new limb but it hopped off with it's stump.

Did, I put it down to the phosphorus and potassium in the wee mix, despite the nitrogen that you appear to think all consuming.

Listen, there is no way that adding any kind of fertliser gives clover a competitive advantage over grasses. The fact that you stopped using fertliser before pissing on your lawn is the most likely cause of the effect you have seen.

Did, I put it down to the phosphorus and potassium in the wee mix

I’d heard somewhere that spreading wood ash led to good results because of the potassium content, but I’ve not been brave enough to try.

Dammit. I've been leaving some of the lawn long and sheared it down on Sunday. Today I raked up the "hay" and found half a slow worm. (edit to say yes it was properly sliced and not pulling the "drop the tail" trick)

Today I raked up the “hay” and found half a slow worm. (edit to say yes it was properly sliced 

One of the things you can do is a "two stage cut" where you cut the upper part of the grass cover but not down to ground, leave 150mm ish if unsure. Leave it overnight and it gives the animals which like more cover some time to move away by themselves. Also good to leave some of the arisings a short while before collecting, if you want some seed drop, so win-win. More time consuming though and hard to achieve with a normal lawnmower alone.

I’d heard somewhere that spreading wood ash led to good results because of the potassium content, but I’ve not been brave enough to try.

The ash from my woodstove used to go on the lawn so possibly the explanation for it being a clover sanctuary in the first place, if you are upwind and just sort of scatter it before rain you get a very light coverage, if you are downwind you choke and look like a snowman, but the coverage is very light as the wind carries it, before rain so it washes the lawn after, certainly no harm done.

Ash and wee, superfoods for plants and we bin and flush it then go out and buy chemicals.

I'm developing a serious obsession for composting at the minute, grass clippings and food waste mixed with bits of cardboard, 2 liter bottle of boiling water shoved down in, poly bag over the top, today it was too hot to put your hand in, the bin is visibly digesting, drops by two thirds a week.

today it was too hot to put your hand in,

A while back the brown bin hadn’t been collected for a while in the summer and was full of grass clippings. Visibly steaming first thing in the morning…

I can recommend this book:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/No-Nettles-Required-Reassuring-Gardening/dp/1905811144/ref=asc_df_1905811144/?tag=googshopuk-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=310940869184&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=12680609708378115273&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1007158&hvtargid=pla-564724024069&psc=1&th=1&psc=1

Visibly steaming first thing in the morning…

Reminds me of a girl I used to know.

I'll get my coat.

We have a fascinating system set up, the council takes our grass clippings and food waste away and turns it into compost, thousands of trucks, man power and facilities, some places they pay for this, then you can get free compost at the recycling center, effectively paying someone to take it away and compost it, some do this and then go to B+Q every spring and buy compost, the carbon footprint of compost must be through the roof.

And the whole time you could just dump it in a bin in the corner of the garden and do it yourself save the planet and get free compost.

And the whole time you could just dump it in a bin in the corner of the garden and do it yourself save the planet and get free compost.

On the other hand, the council anaerobic digester will deal with stuff that a garden compost bin won’t.

Not a reason not to be composting stuff that can be done at home, of course.

Composting garden waste is amazing. I find it fascinating that you can pop your veg/fruit peel, grass clipping and other green bits and bobs into a container (we use a wooden construction) and nature makes into something that you can grow tomatoes, veg, flowers or mulch with 6 months later.
I stress we never put cooked food, meat or potato peel in, the local cats rats and other creatures would be all over it.

I got it wrong last year, just too much grass clippings and not mixing it properly, result was food waste sitting on top and...a field mouse city, when I opened it up in spring there was a mouse waterfall and the compost was just stinky rotted grass, tomatoes and nasturtiums loved it but it was not matured properly and stank like a polecat for a few days...hence seeking advice and new regime.

Already this year the stuff at the bottom is getting composty, the heat is outrageous, food waste is digested in days and gone, I make a hole in the center and drop food waste down it and it cooks, got to keep it cooking I think that's the secret.

While I'm here something I tried this maybe of use, I saved a load of used paper coffee cups last year at work and germinated the seeds from Tesco tomatoes that I just had/chuck out, basically one tomato gives enough seeds to grow way too many plants, squashed and spread out on a bit of kitchen towel and left to dry, then sat in a tray with a bit of damp and eventually...voila, baby tomato plants, pot on into the coffee cups and off and running.
I got a load of weird tomatoes, one turned out to be a commercial hanging bush..or something, I had to drape those over a wall, grew like grapes with big long strings of tiny tomatoes, the other ones turned out normal, all grown outside in Scotland no problem.
I ended up with enough tomato plants to supply the neighbourhood and enough to keep me going.

We have 2 elderly neighbours who have immaculate gardens, trimmed, pruned and mowed to within an inch of their lives. Unfortunately yesterday the chap got cross with me, as our hedge was looking messy over the top of his two fence panels. The other neighbour, a lady, a very good friend of his was also cross regarding her fence.
I just wonder can the older generation 'let go' and realise without our hedge, wild patch, no mow lawn, trees, pond, nettles etc, they wouldn't have the moths, butterflies, bees, birds, amphibians and mammals that they enjoy watching.
It was a shock when he said he wanted our hedge pulling up and doesn't give a toss about any of the above and only wants a neat garden that his visitors can look at.
Luckily both sets of neighbours are intelligent and we have managed to calm them down.
But, I do wonder how we can change this perception of having an incredibly neat garden to 'letting go a little'.
He was out a few weeks ago spraying weedkiller over garlic mustard, a wild plant which is one of only a few which feed the orange tip butterfly.
We'll have to replace the fence panels and chop the hedge to just below the top.
It was so upsetting for me, as we've been neighbours for 15 years and always got on.

My garden is really quite small. Lawn area is approx 4m x 3m with a narrow border I created around 3 sides - 4th side is the small patio against rear elevation of house. As an experiment I have cut the grass to the normal height around the edges of the lawn - approx 2 mower widths on all 4 sides, and left the grass in the middle to grow. Its growing tall in some bits and not others. 2 questions:
1. Is it worth attempting to grow wildflowers amongst the taller grass now, as its already growing longer?
2. At the end of the year do I need to do anything different with the long grass area or just leave it to keep growing?
TIA

@Bunnyhop if ever there was a candidate for the frozen sausages....

You folks need this site and resources.
We partner with them at work for some of our school projects.

http://www.wlgf.org/

It was a shock when he said he wanted our hedge pulling up and doesn’t give a toss about any of the above and only wants a neat garden that his visitors can look at.

I'm often quoted at work - "who said schools should look like a golf course?". It's poor environmentally, barren for learning, uninspiring for play.

Look around at the mown verges, flat grass instead of plants, flowers, shrubs and trees.

Look at the chemicals our councils merrily throw at schools, nurserys, parks and public spaces. All to what end? Something that looks neat, but is bereft of biodiversity, hotter, windier, colder and less welcoming.

It's a deep seated culture of a couple of generations. And, like brexit, hard to fathom.

Edit: 97% of school outdoor space in Scotland is mown grass and flat tarmac. About the worst environment for climate change, biodiversity, learning and play. And school grounds, after forests, make up the largest proportion of local authority owned land up here.

I have no figures for England and Wales.

Can you tell I'm starting on a project to do with this?

To be fair if we'd have had any cover the teachers would have never seen us again

We're just finishing redoing our garden. Unfortunately, it's tiny and slopes a lot so in order to get some space we can actually use and be part of we need a terraced garden. It now has a lot of patio, a small lawn and tons of flower borders. We've stuffed the borders with as many native-like and bee-attractive plants as we can though, and whilst I'm not sure if numbers are up compared to the previous garden the variety of flying insects seems to be. Also lots more creepy crawlies in the soil which is now much richer.

@matt_outandabout I just discovered this thread, I’ve contributed to the No Mow May thread and also the STW Positivity thread with my experiences of helping wildlife. I am lucky enough to have a 1\2 acre plot. When we bought it, it was very overgrown with many very old fruit trees that gradually succumbed to honeydew fungus. I rescued lots of birch, willow and ash trees (in our 2CV) from “the most polluted site in Europe” across the road from us. They’re now well established at the top of the garden 40’ plus in height. Campion, wood anemone, celandine, bluebells and all sorts now well established. Brambles and nettles have to be controlled, not eradicated by mechanical means. Ladysmock came back this year and Matrinalis and evening primrose keep coming back. The biggest triumph though is the front where we have a shared triangle of grass. Some twenty years ago I spotted a violet and carefully mowed around it until it had seeded, they’re everywhere now! I also found an orchid even though it’s an acid soil. Carefully marked with a stick in case the neighbour does his once every two two years grass cut! I’ve left a strip this year and, another orchid! The verge next to the road I’ve encouraged is full of all sorts of wild stuff, the rest of the verge was as well until N.E.D.D.C. used some sort of Napalm on it.
It takes a while but cut the grass very late on and all sorts appear eventually!

I'm only mowing the lawn, the rest of the plot i've left this year, so of the 1200sqm of green space i've got, 400sqm is a lawn and flowerbeds of sorts, 400sqm is long grass, wild flowers, weeds etc and 400m is forest (which backs onto another couple of million sqm of forest).

Will have to cut back the long grass at the front as it's riddled with mares tail and the grass is well over half a meter tall now. Will reseed with wildflowers when the time is right though.

We let a portion of our grass grow wild last year and have done the same this year, we have 15 orchids which great and lots of ox eyed daisies. Decided to weed out the thistles as they will take over, and keep the ragwort under control- otherwise it’s left to its own devices, my kind of gardening!! Oh and carpet of wild strawberries 😀

Our house plot is next to a nature reserve, so it’s as much about how we blend the two - we live amidst a herd of red deer, so we have had to fence off a couple of areas or we’d just have gorse bushes and bracken. We have a tumbledown drystone wall that is our rear boundary that is home to lots of amphibians and voles. We’ve also created a big brash pile along the back wall that provides cover for lots of creatures. I’ve built a big, 2-bay compost heap from pallets, each bay is a cubic metre. The chickens arrive in the next few weeks so a source of manure for the compost heap. We’ve got a few wild orchids growing in the garden - there are at least 4 species in the reserve so trying to encourage them and achieve SSSI status. Across the adjacent field and along the coast is some of Scotland’s temperate rainforest - there are a pair of nesting ravens in the tallest tree, a few buzzards and white tailed eagles regularly fly across. We’ve got 2 hedgehog feeding stations, also frequented by a small feral cat.

We've got a sizable garden, the bottom bit of it (about 1100sqm) I keep in reasonably neat condition (tho it's more clover than grass) with fairly natural native hedges that I don't trim. It's absolutely rammed with birds (got a particularly cute pair of great spotted wood peckers at the moment). That then goes up to a row of beach trees which I use as a natural barrier between the more or less maintained bit to the 'wild' bit.

The top bit (maybe a shade under 1 acre) has lots of mature (ish) trees down each the side and a copsey hawthorn bit at the top, I mow a small patch which we use for tents, bbqs, and stuff at the very top, the rest of it (bar some paths i mow in it) is left to grow long. This bit I mow a couple of times over winter and then once in the late summer (then bale using a homemade bailer - pita).

Last autumn we rotovated a bit of the top bit and replanted with wild seed mix which has seen a bit more variety this year - quite a bit of yellow rattle which will hopefully spread. Also had a few orchids this year. I've also planted some native trees at the top this year, so hopefully they'll provide a bit more habitat.

We bought the house at the start of last year and the previous owner had surrounded it with deer fence to keep their dogs in. I've taken that down in places it won't annoy the neigbours and as a result we now get lots of muncjac (some of them seem to live permently in the top bit now), badgers, and foxes. I think I saw a fallow deer once but not 100%. I was working on the shed i'm building and saw a barn owl fly past about 20 feet away a couple of weeks ago which was cool. The muncjac often come down to the mown bit in the morning to eat from the hedges (see photo from the bedroom window below!). Last week we seemed to be getting a lot of swallows, and also we see quite a few bats (last week one of them flew into the house hid under my daughters toys, then bit her when she poked it in the face, and now she's having the rabbies vaccine! Not ideal).

The only 'anti' nature thing i'm in the process of doing is thinning out the grey squirrels. They've killed a few of the trees this year by ringing their bark, so i'm not sure what option i've got (i'm not using posion - shooting and using this co2 trap thing) as we've not got an infinite supply of trees. Feel pretty bad about it so if anyone has any non lethal suggestions i'm all ears! Hopefully this is offset by the habitat we've created in the mean time. We've got a 18 month year old who really loves it (as do our cats - though one of them is a bit of a vole death machine, thankfully we have quite a few spare and both of them are useless at catching birds!)

Work in progress, but in spring, summer and autumn it's lovely, tho quite hard work keeping on top of it (cutting the hay, composting leaves etc). In winter we're on poorly drained clay soil, so it can be a bit grim, but it doesn't last forever I guess.

Wow this thread has really cheered me up. Everyone is trying to make some sort of difference.
Amazingly just before the falling out with the neighbours (I cold hear him muttering from behind his fence/our hedge, that's why I went round to his house to try and help) I spotted a hummingbird hawk moth on the self seeded valerian, I was ecstatic and then it all kicked off with next door.

Fazzini - I think it's too late to plant a wildflower mini meadow as you need to take up the garden, wildflowers do not like fertile soil, also sow yellow rattle (which was sent to me years ago by fellow STWer slowoldman).
Cut the long grass in the autumn/end of summer. Our wildflower section didn't take this year as the grass was too dominant, however we do have more clover, buttercups, daisies and dandelions.

If everyone just did a little something, even if it's not pulling up a dandelion in spring (some of the first food for bees),putting in the tiniest of ponds, or planting a bug friendly plant, then its a start.

I had a few of my leafy green plants stripped of leaves a couple of years ago when we had an unseasonably early freeze and snowfall.

Bloody deer and moose took it all, even found hoof prints in the snow on the deck. It's taken two years to even come close to recovery, and i reckon they'll take the lot this autumn too.

Does anyone have insect hotels or bird/bat boxes?

I've got 4 bird boxes already and just ordered another dozen birdboxes to put in the forest around the place, and 4 bird feeders. Just researching bat boxes...

(also getting quite a few raptors turning up as well. Mostly see them in the tall trees though.)

I've got four or five bird boxes up and a few more to put up next winter. Also have a insect hotel which seems to have solitary bees in it. I've got a bat box but not put it up yet. I may make an owl box in the winter. We certainly get a lot of boxes, but i'm not sure where they nest (not my loft thankfully!).

We used to keep bees, but stopped when my wife became pregnant the first time, so we'll start that again at some point.

Raptor wise, we get a lot of red kites and buzzards around/above the garden - the kites are not nesting in our trees but are nesting in next doors about 100m away (no idea where the buzzards nest). As above i've also now seen we have a barn owl that hunts in the top long grass in the evenings. I've heard lots of tawney owls (or maybe just one loud one!) but never seen them.

On a side note, there don’t seem to be many butterflies this year 🙁

New to this, great thread.  After some advice though about 'no mow'. We are lucky to live in a very rural area at 900 ft elevation in the Shropshire hills.  My wife is the main gardener and we try very hard to be wildlife friendly.  Lots of borders and flower beds are allowed to go a bit wild. I don't cut hedges until the winter, We have loads of bird and bat boxes, DIY insect 'hotels' etc.  Piles of brush and rotting wood are strategically placed for insects and hedgehogs. We keep honey bees, but the air is also full of wild bees and other pollinators.  We have swallows nesting in a couple of wooden outbuildings, as well as loads of other birds.  Overhead we are also lucky to have Curlews, Red Kites etc.

We regularly see Roe, Munjac, Badgers, Stoats, Weasels and Foxes.  Though the latter are a mixed blessing as we keep chickens and very occasionally lose one to them!  Foxes being foxes though, we can live with that and just try very hard to keep the chooks secure.

Anyhow, enough prattling on.  My questions. We have a rough paddock of just under an acre at the back of our garden and veg beds etc.  At the moment, I mow it but leave the clippings on it. It is home to a lot of moles! It is bordered by a rough hedge of Elder, Bramble, Holly, Blackthorn etc. with a few Oak trees and a few other trees we have planted.  There is an unmown strip 2-3m wide down one side, which is mostly nettles.  I would like to experiment with leaving the paddock, or perhaps just half of it initially, unmown.  We have a willow dome we planted right at the end which is an ace place to have a glass of wine on a summer evening, so will probably mow a wavy path to it.

As the hedges and border contain a lot of nettles and brambles and there are lots of large thistles in neighbouring fields, will these species just take over?

I realise I will need to cut it a couple of times  a year, how do people do this with grasses a few feet high?  I love the idea of learning to scythe, but realistically not enough to to put the time in learning and practising it.  Can I just strim it with my petrol strimmer/brushcutter?

What will I do with an acres worth of hay? We are avid composters but with 6 large compost bins struggling to keep up with the cuttings from our proper lawn, chicken bedding and kitchen waste - I wouldn't be able to compost it.

I'm thinking I may have left it a little late this year, would I be best to leave it until next spring?

Regarding bat and bird, boxes remember they need to be fixed to certain locations facing a certain way as birds need cover without the baby birds frying in warm spring sun. The RSPB is a great place for info. We have 2 bird boxes and bats are behind some house tiles.

As someone who used to have land and kept horses, I'm sure the hay will get sold. Or you could get a local farmer to cut and bale the meadow for you.
Yes - certain plants, hog weed, ragwort, nettles, brambles etc will take over if not managed. But all these plants are absolutely vital as food sources and breeding places for many bugs, butterflies, moths (also in huge decline) and bees.
We also have a bug hotel but it needs upgrading from the 2* to 5* :0)

Yep we followed advice when siting the bird and bat boxes, they've never been empty and the bird boxes produce more than one brood a year.  I'm on good terms with the two farmers whose land borders us, but not sure it would be worth their while to bale an acre or less.  Access is also a bit difficult for a tractor/baler so I reckon I will have do it myself. Will horsey people still want it if it's full of thistles, nettles etc? And surely not if there is any ragwort in it?

The only ‘anti’ nature thing i’m in the process of doing is thinning out the grey squirrels. They’ve killed a few of the trees this year by ringing their bark, so i’m not sure what option i’ve got (i’m not using posion – shooting and using this co2 trap thing) as we’ve not got an infinite supply of trees. Feel pretty bad about it so if anyone has any non lethal suggestions i’m all ears! Hopefully this is offset by the habitat we’ve created in the mean time. We’ve got a 18 month year old who really loves it (as do our cats – though one of them is a bit of a vole death machine, thankfully we have quite a few spare and both of them are useless at catching birds!)

Unfortunatley a high density of deer, and particularly Muntjac, is to the woodland understory what the squirrels are to the canopy - a major problem. They will basically carpet bomb a woodland floor and nothing will grow or get away except for grasses, sedges, plants that spread by runners and certain other things they're not so keen on. The woods will become very thin and sparse and there will be a massive reduction in biodiversity. So my advice would be keep shooting squirrels and also apply for a firearms license so that you can manage the deer too. They might look cute but removing deer from the woods would be single best thing that could be done for the overall health of the ecosystem.

I realise I will need to cut it a couple of times a year, how do people do this with grasses a few feet high? I love the idea of learning to scythe, but realistically not enough to to put the time in learning and practising it. Can I just strim it with my petrol strimmer/brushcutter?

I can offer experience here! I've got a ride on, but realistically I would have to cut it very slowly with that or burn the belt out. Last year I hired a self propelled flail mower (i actually hired a self propelled sickle mower but that got broken by the previous hirers so they gave me the flail mower instead). It took me most of a day to mow about an acre of 3 ft tall grass. I think the ideal tool is a sickle mower tho, as the flail mower just bashes it all into submission (Along with any wildlife too stupid to get out of the way) whereas a sickle mower snips it neatly at the base making it easier to move around / bail. Hiring the machine cost about 70 quid for the weekend I think. One of these things:

https://www.earthtools.com/implements-mowing/cutterbarmowers/

I then raked it all into windrows using a hay rake - i think this was actually the wrong thing to do - I should have left it to dry out on the surface for a couple of days rather than raking straight away.

Then I was left with an acre of hay. Which is quite a bit (probably 3-4 T). My solution to this was to bale the majority of it using a hand bailer that i knocked up in an evening - one of these: https://www.caringforgodsacre.org.uk/resources/films/video-hand-hay-baler/ worked really well, but it was hard work making all the bales. I think I ended up with 40 - 50 of them. I don't have good enough access to get a tractor and bailer in unfortunately. Get the string from ebay or mole country stories - bailing twine.

I then just put an ad on facebook market place and a woman that runs a donkey sanctuary was around in about 10 minutes! I suspect I could have sold them if I could have been arsed. Certainly no shortage of takers. She's offered to come and help this year so I suspect she knows she's on to a good thing.

My plan for this year is basically the same, but to use a sickle mower and i've been a bit more strategic in how i've mowed paths into the long bits - the bits that took longest were the straggly bits near the edges so i've put paths here. I still expect it'll be a solid weekend of effort to cut it all and then several evenings in the week to bail.

The other thing i noted was that if you bale it when it is at all moist it'll get pretty hot, esp if you stack the bales. I'd read that this was a thing, but i kinda just thought "yeah right whatever". Def a thing tho. Solution is to let it dry for longer if you can or not to stack the bales too closely. I warned donkey lady some of them were a bit moist and she didn't seem bothered - i think she'd seen worse. She wasn't worried about nettles, but I guess ragwort wouldn't be ideal - I yanked any that i saw out before i cut (it's pretty obvious).

Don't even think of trying to strim it all - you'd be there forever. An acre is 4000sqm - lets say it takes 15 seconds to properly strim a square meter with a brush cutter - that's 17 hours of non stop strimming. And it'll probably take longer than 15 seconds!