Untidy for Nature
A recent caller to our house asked if we wanted our tall grass and hedge cut back. I said ‘no thank you’ and that we were growing it that way for wildlife. He was looking for work and obviously thought our garden looked untidy and in need of attention. It prompted me to write this article.
Our garden is definitely not tidy but it's that way on purpose, not because we don’t care about it or to annoy the neighbours, but to provide a bit more space for nature. We like it that way and have far more plants, insects, animals and birds living in it or passing through and over it than were there a few years ago.
The moles, that were with us for three or four years, have moved on, leaving uneven ground but also beautifully tilled soil that is full of worms and other ground dwelling life, including mycelium, the underground network of fungal filaments you get in healthy soils. The squirrels, which seem to like eating our strawberries, have buried cobnuts and acorns for winter food, some of which they have forgotten about and have grown into hazel and oak trees. We have also had a number of alder, birch and willow trees which have self-seeded and are doing very well. We move those that really aren’t in helpful places and cut others back to use the branches around the garden, such as supports for climbing roses, but mostly we leave them to it. Some survive, some don’t.
Earlier in the year the front garden featured dandelions and clover, later we had ox eye daisies, which have given way to tall yellow flowered ragwort, wild carrot that looks like cow parsley and purple flowering thistles – although we’ve recently pulled up the thistles before they go to seed and really take over. If you look closely at the ragwort, some of the plants are covered in yellow and black striped caterpillars, which strip them of their leaves, leaving just green stalks. These caterpillars will eventually become cinnabar moths, with grey wings with red patches.
The plants are surrounded by tall yellowing swaying grasses, the seeds from which feed all sorts of birds, such as goldfinches, wood pigeons, sparrows and black birds, as well as other little critters, such as crickets, grasshoppers, ants and mice. In turn, these creatures are preyed upon by frogs and toads, weasels, kestrels and sparrow hawks, all of which I have seen in the garden at one time or another.
Many gardeners would see the plants in our front garden as weeds that should be removed. However, we like them and encourage them as part of our very small rewilding project. Our front and back gardens are not neat but both are thriving ecosystems, swarming with wildlife. Even the leylandii hedges are doing their bit. Having let them grow out, birds can now get inside them for cover and to nest where before, when we cut them back, they were an impenetrable green wall. So, for example, when I opened the bedroom curtains the other day, three greenfinches that were feeding on the verbena that has self-seeded in part if the vegetable bed, flew up and into the hedge for safety. This was particularly gratifying as previously we have very rarely seen greenfinches in the garden.
All these plants provide habitat and food for mice, frogs, toads and all sorts of spiders, grubs, insects and butterflies. These were mostly large whites and browns in July but we are now getting red admirals, peacock, comma and painted ladies, as well as ones I can’t identify – I have to admit I only have a very inexpert knowledge of the creatures in our garden but it is improving as we go with our rewilding.
We regularly get swifts, swallows and house martens, all of which feed on tiny flies, arcing overhead and intend to put up a swift box at some stage. For the last few years we have also had a barn owl that sometimes hunts up the side of the garden in the mornings and evenings, usually when heavy rain has prevented it from doing so under the cover of darkness. And only this morning we had a large number of goldfinches that were feeding on the borage seeds, and half a dozen bullfinches that seem interested in the raised beds nearest the kitchen, that we have not planted in this year and have therefore got all sorts of self-seed plants growing in them.
This is all part of our very relaxed approach, where we let a certain amount of weeds grow in and around vegetable beds, which provides a bit of height for the birds to perch on in safety in the middle of the garden. The sunflowers which we planted are now eight feet tall or more and provide height for the birds also. Later in the year, when the blooms have gone, leaving the fat brown seed heads, we get all sorts of birds eating the sunflower seeds, including marsh, coal, blue and great tits – I have been assured by a bona fide twitcher and bird expert friend whom I told about them that they are probably marsh tits in our area rather than willow tits, although to my eye the two are indistinguishable.
Patches of what was once lawn now provide habitat for what I think are yellow cats ears, which are like tall dandelions, and orange fox and cubs. We've also got plenty of pink valerian, willow herb and purple verbena, all self-seeded. Plus, of course, we get a lot of thistles, not tall purple flowering this time but the smaller less showy type. We pull these up in the middle of the garden but leave them in the wilder fringes with the nettles and brambles. For the last couple of years we've even had a pink orchid, of which there are many more up on Wenlock Edge.
Our ‘untidy for nature’ approach is not about abandoning the garden to its own devices but involves watching what’s happening and influencing how it all develops. We learned this approach on a permaculture course we went on at the end of 2019, delivered by Steve Jones from a company called Sector 39 based in Wales. Permaculture is about creating sustainable ways of living, developing ecologically harmonious, efficient and productive systems that can be used by anyone, anywhere. It was really helpful in getting us to understand the value of biodiversity.
On the course Steve told us about The One-Straw Revolution a freely available publication which describes how Masanobu Fukuoka, a Japanese scientist turned farmer, developed no-till, herbicide and pesticide-free cultivation methods from which he created a particular method of agriculture, commonly referred to as ‘natural farming’ or ‘do-nothing farming’. Do-nothing farming isn’t about being lazy as the name suggests but is more about growing stuff you want, with rather than competing against nature in your garden or on your farm.
This approach appeals to me a great deal but has required me to rid myself of any tidiness obsessions I may have had. The good thing is, once you get used to everything not being straight, trimmed, neat, tidy, in its place and ordered, you start enjoying a more chaotic outlook. For example, when dock grew up in the middle of the garden we were tempted to get rid of it, particularly when it went a rusty colour and looked dead. However, we left it and, taking a good look at it, discovered that the rusty heads are actually thousands of tiny tiny flowers that, presumably, are there to attract tiny tiny insects – food for the insects, pollination for the plant, an everyday wonder of nature that goes mostly unnoticed by people, particularly if they rip the plant up and dispose of it.
Another wonder of nature is all the ant hills we’ve got, now we don’t cut the grass apart from pathways. Some of them are over two feet high and the same across. Again, many gardeners don’t look on ants favourably, but they help with pollination and seed dispersal and are great for soil health. It may have been ants that were responsible for seeding the alders down the bottom of our garden which, although seen as just another tree these days, were apparently once highly prized and grown in Shropshire to make clogs.
Of course, if you have a garden you may not want it rampant with weeds and wildlife for any number of good reasons. But if you’re up for everything not being neat and trim, you could put your efforts into being untidy for nature. Alternatively, if you want to keep your garden ‘just so’ or don’t have a garden but are interested in encouraging wildlife generally you could consider joining Shropshire Wildlife Trust.
