Song for Jasmine » Bird feeder

Green Gardening

Tony — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 19:38:20 +0000

my garden in 2009

Is your garden green? Well of course it’s green, it’s got plants in it, that’s not what I mean. How environmentally-friendly is it? Are there things we can we do to make it more friendly, yet still have a good-looking garden?

That’s actually a rather complex question. A garden is a place where we meet nature face to face, where we try to grow things and so does nature. Nature has had a lot of practice at this, and for us to impose our will may take some considerable effort. Alternatively, we could give nature a helping hand, working with it, instead of against it. That way, we can have a beautiful garden which is good for the environment, and which may even take less effort to maintain than we would otherwise expend.

We maintain our gardens with lawn-mowers, hedge-trimmers, fertilisers, herbicides and pesticides. Machinery requires energy (electricity or petrol) to run, and the chemicals we use have to be refined, bottled, and shipped to us. Herbicides and pesticides are obviously not environmentally friendly, they’re designed to kill things after all. Many of them are also harmful to humans, so careless use can have serious consequences for you or your neighbours.

We might think that fertilisers can’t be bad for the environment, after all, they’re supposed to make things grow. But many fertilisers rely on minerals mined somewhere in the world being processed and transported during their manufacture, much like many of the things we buy these days. Fertilisers that wash off the land and into rivers and lakes can upset those ecosystems by causing excess growth of algae, which can in turn kill fish and other aquatic animals. So even fertilisers come with an environmental cost.

cricket on beetroot

So, if we could use less machinery and less chemicals, that would be a great start to making our garden ‘greener’, and save us some money in the process. That’s easy to say, but how, then, do we control weeds and pests?

One easy way to keep weeds under control is with a plastic ground-sheet. This is a sheet that covers the ground, you cut holes in it to plant the things you want. The sheet prevents weeds from growing, and your plants have no competition. You may have seen them at the side of motorways, where they are often used. If your plants are low and spreading, they will soon hide the sheet from view. Otherwise, you can cover the sheet with bark or gravel to hide it.

Another good way to control weeds is with mulch. Mulching means putting garden waste onto the surface of the soil. There it forms a dense mat as it decays, which helps protect the soil from drying out and makes it hard for weeds to grow. Grass-cuttings are ideal for mulch, but you can also use autumn leaves, straw, vegetable peelings from the kitchen, or anything that will pack down densely over time. Mulching also feeds the soil, as the mulch decays and releases its nutrients, just like it would in a compost heap. If you use enough mulch on your garden, you may never need to add fertiliser to your plants, the mulch will provide everything they need. That’s easier (and less smelly) than managing a real compost heap!

Alternatively, if you choose your plants carefully you can get the same effect from the plants themselves. There are many low-growing, fast-spreading plants that are very effective at preventing weeds from getting established. If you have only a small area to cover, hardy alpines will do the job nicely. Your local garden centre can help you choose some that are good for your situation. Once they have covered the ground they need very little maintenance. Plants which are taller than the cover-plants will not be affected, so you can have your roses growing quite happily surrounded by living weed-control.

You can also use plants such as clover and alfalfa, which serve double-duty as green manures. This means that they actually enrich the soil as they grow, so you will need less fertiliser to encourage your plants. Either grow them all year round, or just scatter the seeds on the ground towards the end of summer and let them grow through the winter, then dig them in in spring when you prepare to plant for the coming summer.

orange butterfly

So much for the weeds, what about the pests, such as slugs, snails, and insects? Here the best answer is, more insects! And birds, frogs, lizards, and hedgehogs. In other words, the more wildlife you can attract to your garden, the less chance the pests will have to take over your plants. Pests multiply rapidly when they are safe from predators, so if your garden is teeming with wildlife, there will always be something to keep them under control.

Actually, that’s one reason why pesticides are a bad idea. They kill all species of insect, not just the ones you want them to. But the ones we want to kill will bounce back first, and multiply rapidly. That’s because they have no competition for their food (i.e. your plants) and nothing to keep them in check.

Birds are very easy to attract, just keep putting out food for them. They will still take the insects from your plants, especially in the breeding season, because they feed them to their young. Raising chicks is hard work for the parents, so if they can get a quick snack from your bird feeders and then find a juicy fat caterpillar for their young all in one place, they will appreciate it. We’re not the only ones to appreciate one-stop shopping. If you put up some nest boxes too, you can have resident pest-control working for you, all day long.

Frogs and hedgehogs will eat slugs, and they and lizards eat insects, so they can also be very beneficial to your garden. You don’t need a pond to attract frogs, they will be happy with any permanently damp and overgrown area. A shaded spot covered in weeds might well do the job. They can travel quite a distance too, so you may find them even if the nearest pond or stream is some way away. You can attract lizards and hedgehogs by creating spaces where they can hide from predators, such as piles of stones or branches, or leaving part of your garden overgrown. If you leave such shelters available in the winter, they may hibernate there, so they are ready to go to work for you as soon as the spring sun stirs everything into life. Hedgehogs will come regularly if you put out food to attract them, so why not spread some peanuts around your lettuce instead of slug-pellets?

sunflower

Many insects are also useful for keeping pests under control. Ladybirds and lacewings can control greenfly, so are welcome in the garden. You can encourage ladybirds and lacewings by providing over-winter shelters for them, so-called ‘insect hotels‘ where they can hibernate safely. A greenhouse or garage is a good location for such a hotel, anywhere dry and sheltered, preferably away from the worst of the cold.

verbascum thapsus

It’s also possible to deter the pests from staying in your garden in the first place, by a technique called companion planting, or co-planting for short. Some plants deter pests, so can confer their protection on their neighbours. Others attract insects that eat the pests, so achieve the same result. Some plants actually attract pests, and can be used to draw them away from your preferred plants. Many of these companion plants, such as herbs, marigolds, or sunflowers, are easy to grow, and desirable in their own right.

You can also choose plants that are less susceptible to pests in the first place. Maybe a honeysuckle will go nicely on that wall instead of a climbing rose, which is likely to suffer from aphids. Need tall flowers for the back of the garden? How about collecting seed from Common Mullein (Verbascum Thapsus) and planting that. They look just as good as any expensive hybrid you’ll find in the garden centre, and being a native species, they’re probably more tolerant to pests.

great tit and goldfinch on sunflower

We can also help nature directly, rather than just letting it work for us. Instead of cutting down dead plants and burning them at the end of summer, consider leaving them alone until the seeds have set. Sunflowers look just as pretty with blue-tits and goldfinches hanging from them in October, picking at the seeds, as they do when in full flower. When the time comes to cut them down, why not add the stalks to the pile of branches for your hibernating garden assistants, and place the heads around your roses where they will decay in time to fertilise the new growth in spring. Plant a few late-flowering species to help the last insects of summer. Leave your dandelions alone in spring so they flower, the first bees to come out of hibernation will love them.

If you really want to go green with your garden, and can invest some effort to do so, growing your own vegetables is a great idea. By growing your own you can really cut down your carbon footprint by reducing your ‘food miles‘. That means that, instead of someone in the next country growing the stuff, packing it in plastic, and driving it to your local supermarket, you just get it from the garden, and all that plastic and fuel is not needed.

So, making our garden environmentally friendly is not difficult, it only takes a little planning and foresight. Our own environmental footprint, and the quality of wildlife in and around our garden, can vary a lot depending on the approach that we take. You might even save yourself time, money, and effort, and end up with a more satisfying garden as a result.

field of flowers

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The gardening season has begun

Tony — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 06:55:59 +0000

organic seeds

It rained on Sunday, cold and wet. So of course, my mind turns to the garden, and the plants I shall be growing this year.

I was well satisfied with my crops last year, having managed to keep myself, Dweezeljazz, and the local birds well supplied. That said, I kept my sights somewhat low, sticking with plants that had a high chance of success and growing lots of them. This year, I’m going to be more ambitious. I’ve got a lot more tubs, a lot more seed varieties, and even a couple of cheap and cheerful coldframes to help things along.

You can see some of the seeds I bought in the photo at the top. Simple plain packets, these all came from the Organic Catalogue site, based in England. They specialise in organic seeds, which I think is just great. Not everything they offer is organic, but they have a wide selection that is, and it’s all clearly labelled, so you don’t get confused. Ordering from them was easy, and everything arrived promptly.

window-mounted bird-feeder

They provide a number of other interesting products too. My mum now has one of their window-mounted bird-feeders, as a mothers’ day gift.

Looking around on their site, I see they work with the Ferme de Sainte Marthe in France. They also sell organic seeds online, so for my francophone visitors, you may find that a more convenient place to shop. You can download their catalogue directly from their site. The Organic Catalogue site doesn’t have a downloadable catalogue (shame on them!), but you can order one delivered free by post if you’re interested.

organic tomato seeds

So what am I going to plant this year? Lots! By popular request, I’m going to grow tomatoes this year. Dweezeljazz wanted me to grow some last year, but I was concerned about the occasional high winds we get here which might harm them. This year, I’m going to try three varieties, and see how it goes. I have ‘Gardeners Delight’ from the Organic Catalogue, and ‘Silvery Fir Tree’ and ‘Sugar Sweetie’, sent to us by our good friend, Shannon Ryan. These last two have absolutely the prettiest seed packets I’ve ever seen, take a look at them! Three varieties are enough for me, but not for some people. Anne Tanne is growing 19 varieties of tomato this year. Good luck Anne!

I’m also going to try my hand at growing aubergines. I’ve never grown them before, so I picked a small variety, ‘mini Bambino‘. Hopefully there’s less that can go wrong with them, though I gather they can be quite tricky. I’ve got two varieties of peppers, ‘Golden California Wonder’ (a sweet pepper) and ‘Early Jalapeno’, nice and hot. I’ve grown cayenne and other hot peppers before, and I know that a few plants can yield enough peppers to freeze and keep for the year, so I have high hopes for the jalapenos.

Parsley, spinach, coriander and radish should be easy enough to grow. I’m going to try celery, though from what I have read on the web that can be quite difficult. The few peas I grew last year worked well, so I’ll be growing a lot more this year. Rather than staking them up, I’ll let them trail over the side of the tubs, so they don’t compete with other plants for vertical space.

The other new vegetable for me will be parsnips. I’ve no idea how they will grow in tubs, but thanks to the guide to parnips by Veg Plotting, I have a few pointers. My compost may be too fresh for them, having only had one season of growth, so I’m anticipating a few split roots. As long as they taste OK, I don’t mind.

'Silvery Fir Tree' tomato seedlings

Lettuce, chard, and beetroot will also be there again. I have a few pots of seedlings coming along already, along with some tomato seedlings. They spend the evenings indoors and the days outside, in the coldframes in the sun (if there is any!). I planted them a while ago, a little too early perhaps. They sufferred a bit from the lack of light at that time, but they’re going strong now. We’re due for another week of cold nights, but after that I hope they will be able to stay outdoors permanently.

I don’t intend to do much in the flower department, my garden is primarily for eating. Sunflowers and marigolds again, yes, definitely. This year I will add sweet peas, having – err – found some seeds on a plant hanging over a garden wall last year. They would have fallen onto the road and been washed down the drain, so I’m sure the owner wouldn’t mind me rescuing them.

I’m also diversifying into fruit. I’ve grown ‘normal’ strawberries before, but this year I’m going to try ‘alpine strawberries‘. I know how readily strawberries get damaged, or eaten by almost anything that finds them, hence the choice of something that will, I expect, mature quicker due to its smaller fruit. I don’t mind sharing with the birds, but I do want to make sure I get enough for myself.

tubs waiting for plants

As soon as the evenings get a little warmer I’ll be planting everything I can, but for now I have only a few plants getting a headstart. Hopefully it won’t be long before I can get more on the go. I’ve got all my tubs lined up waiting for plants, and I’m looking forward to filling them. I got a great deal of satisfaction from my garden last year, and it’s bigger and better this year, so I should have even more fun playing in it.

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While out walking

Tony — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 21:25:17 +0000

Mont Blanc and Alps from the Pays de Gex

Spring almost came to the Pays de Gex recently, and our morning walks were more pleasant for a while. It’s cold again now, but for a few days it was even warm enough to stop and take a few photos, here’s a selection for you.

deer jawbone

The most unusual thing we’ve found recently has to be this lower jawbone, presumably of a deer. It was lying right in the middle of the snow-covered path, with no clue of how it got there. It must be rather old, I guess, it looks like it’s been around for a while.

There are a lot of deer around here, so I guess it’s not surprising to come across a bone or two from time to time, but this is the first for us. Some people are luck enough to find the occasional antler instead of a jaw, but I guess we have to start somewhere.

bark with damage by borer-beetles

Then there’s this beautifully-carved fallen branch, with all these intricate markings in the wood where the bark has been stripped away. I would have guessed that this was beetle-damage from that alone, but thanks to Seabrook at The Marvellous in Nature, I know rather more about them.

The deeper grooves are where the adults tunnel along the bark, the female laying eggs as she goes.

more beetle-damage on the same branch

The smaller grooves are where the young eat their way along the tree, somehow apparently managing to avoid their siblings as they do so. This particular branch seems to have been very popular, it’s covered in tunnels.

Strangely enough, it’s not just Seabrooke writing about bark-beetles, her mom has just posted about them at Willow House Chronicles. Seems like an interesting family…

Pyrrhocoris Apterus" title="fire bug Pyrrhocoris Apterus" width="250" height="496" class="size-medium wp-image-2286" />

fire bug Pyrrhocoris Apterus

Closer to home, there’s a large tree near where we live which harbours a good collection of fire bugs, Pyrrhocoris Apterus. They were there just before winter in the same place, sunning themselves in the last rays of autumn. I guess they must have over-wintered under the bark, there’s certainly room for all of them in the crevices of this old tree.

fire bug 'face'

Not only are they colourful, they have very distinctive markings on their backs. It looks uncannily like a face, reminding me in particular of an African mask. You can see that clearly in the close-up.

plastic net from a fat-ball

Finally, one thing that often turns up on our morning walks as the snow melts is these plastic bags, the sort used to hold fat-balls for feeding the birds. It’s great that so many people put them out, but I’m a little concerned that small birds or animals could get entangled in them.

If you put out fat-balls in these bags, please consider threading a piece of string through the mesh and tying it off somewhere, to prevent the empty bag from blowing away. Then you can easily dispose of the bags without them ending up in the environment!

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Little feet in the snow

Tony — Sat, 27 Feb 2010 13:47:07 +0000

footprints in the snow

footprints around bird food

chaffinch looking in

chaffinch checking me out

OK, where’s the food

The snow is melting fast outside now, there’s only a few piles of mush left on the terrace. The last snowfall here was almost a week ago, and that was a scant few flakes, just enough to cover the ground thinly.

It may have been a light snowfall, but it was enough to show me that little feet had been walking around just outside before I got up that morning.

It’s not just one or two footprints either, there seems to have been quite a gathering around the food. I hope nobody got trampled in the crush!

We have bird-food on our garden wall, but in the coldest weather the robins were getting very territorial about it, spending more time fighting than eating. That’s why we put more food near our patio doors, far away from the wall. This kept the robins far enough apart that they actually found time to eat instead of fight.

The food near our patio doors is quite popular, despite being close to the house. It’s interesting to see how different birds approach it. Sparrows just come right up and start munching. They spend a lot of time in our eaves, so they’re well accustomed to us and our comings and goings, and show no fear. Other birds are more cautious, such as this chaffinch.

This is the only chaffinch I’ve seen visiting our garden so far, though we see many on our morning walks. This one did what many other birds have done, he landed a little further out and took a good look before coming closer.

He’s clearly spotted me, and that sideways look is him measuring me up, deciding if I’m going to make trouble for him or not. Eventually, it seems he decides I’m not a threat, and he turns his attention to more important things, the food!

Blue-tits and great-tits show a similar caution. They land nearby, take a good look round, then hop up to the food, take something (typically a peanut) and fly off to deal with it somewhere else. They seem to get more comfortable with time, the first visits were rather cautious, and sometimes they would fly off without feeding. Now they are more at ease, and will even continue to feed if we go out on the terrace.

Robins will sit by the food for a long time, as if they’re staking a claim to it. Even in the coldest of the recent weather they would sit there, guarding the food. They don’t often chase off sparrows or tits, but if another robin appears within a few feet, it’s instant action. Those birds have attitude!

Now that the local birds have become accustomed to us, we see a steady stream of them. Yesterday and today we saw a willow tit, one that I’ve never seen before. It seems word is getting around that there’s a new place to eat for the birds, and we’re glad of it. Fortunately, lots of people feed the birds around here, so winter is not as difficult for them as it could otherwise be. I’m glad of that.

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Bird feeders

Tony — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 17:54:23 +0000

robin

bird feeder covered with snow

The recent spell of freezing weather is coming to an end, but not before it dropped a foot of snow on our terrace. Birds have a hard time in such cold weather, in fact it amazes me that they manage to survive at all. There’s a very interesting post over at Willow House Chronicles about how birds survive cold temperatures if you’d like to know more about how they manage it.
We’ve been putting out food for the birds again this winter, normally just clearing the snow and placing it on the wall. That seems to suit birds like the robin, above, and our resident sparrows, but it can easily be covered by snow or washed away by rain, so this year we’ve also added some proper bird-feeders.

So many of the feeders in garden centres seem impractical and decorative, but after some shopping around I finally found this very practical feeder shown on the right. It’s not particularly cheap, but it does keep the seed clean and dry against all weathers, which has got to be a good thing. I don’t have anywhere obvious to hang such a feeder, so I took the low-tech solution. I found a suitable branch on our morning walks, tied it to the railings of the fence, and hung the feeder from that.

peanut butter and seed in suet-feeders

We also got two suet-feeders, and then spent some time looking for suet in the shops we frequent. Our favourite bio-store, Satoriz, didn’t have any, but they did have peanut butter, so I used that instead. I’m sure I could have found suet if I had looked around enough, but since the peanut butter is organic and any suet I find would not be, I prefer to use the peanut butter. I buy organic food for myself because I don’t want to eat pesticides, and I don’t see why wild birds should do so either.
I mixed some bird seed in with the peanut butter, quite a lot in fact, put it in the suet feeders, and hung them from another stick I’d picked up on our morning walks.

For a bit more variety, I tied some millet to the fence too, and I continue to put food loose on the wall for those that prefer it there. I also have a thistle-seed sack-feeder for finches, but no seed to put in it yet. Soon, I hope!

Now the restaurant is open, all we need are customers. First to find us was our robin, of course. You can see him here checking out the feeder during the day of heaviest snowfall. Like so many birds, he shows a great deal of curiosity at anything that changes in his environment. Having decided that it’s safe, he continues to be our most regular visitor.

robin and bird feeder

great-tit on suet feeder

magpie looking at millet

A couple of days later and a few more birds had found us. The great-tits seem to like the peanut butter, while blue-tits like the tall feeder. We have even been visited by a magpie, who comes a few times daily, takes 3 or 4 peanuts in one go, and flies off to enjoy them somewhere else. I expect that as time goes by we will get more visitors, and hopefully more species too – I know there are woodpeckers nearby.
The magpie is our largest visitor so far, and unless the chickens down the road escape from their coup we’re not likely to get anything much bigger than them. Some people do get larger birds visiting them, such as our friend Shannon Ryan. Take a look at what she gets visiting her bird feeders. They must take quite a bit of feeding!

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