In 2019, I reinstated our pond, well, a half-size version of the original that I filled when we moved to this house in the late ’90s with small children. The plants, water snails, and frogs thrived, it seems, the birds love it for a drink too, although, I did find a dead Goldfinch in there one day in the summer (victim of a neighbour’s cat, I think).
I also did some wilding of the gardens, front and back, with various seedlings (from RSPB Hope Farm), some packet seeds, and some Seedballs, which I blogged about at the time. I have masses of seeds collected to use this spring, including ones from some wildflowers that were not there deliberately but sprang up and were very attractive to some moth species.
This year, I am going to work with the good people from Seedball to cover a bigger area of the gardens with wildflowers. They have offered me various mixes and hopefully, there will be plants perfect for shade, some that will pull in the honey crowd (bees), and, of course, some for the Lepidoptera. I am hoping for great things from our garden this year, having ticked more than 300 species of Lepidoptera last year, I think that number might be exceeded quickly the more wildflowers.
The wilding of our gardens will benefit the birds, the amphibia, and the invertebrates species, hopefully, and make our small patch a little haven on the edge of farmland here in South Cambridgeshire.