If you want to help wildlife in your garden this winter – and really, why wouldn’t you want to attract birds and bees into your garden at a time when they need help the most – there are plenty of simple steps you can take that are neither expensive nor require a complete redesign.
In fact gardening for wildlife is more sustainable - and more fun - when done resourcefully, you can use entirely found materials to create habitats and construct everything from bird boxes to bug hotels from things you can find lying around your house and garden. A winning weekend activity if you’re a nature nerd and even more so if you have little ones to help you.
I sat down with the incredible naturalist and conservationist Lucy Hobson, who’s known as Lucy Lapwing (@lucy_lapwing) to her many Instagram followers, to find out how to make your garden more hospitable to all creatures great and small over the next few months. And if you want a fun, expert and accessible resource for learning about wildlife in the UK, Lucy’s instagram is a must-follow!
What wildlife needs our help in the garden over winter?
When it comes to wildlife using your garden, you’re only really limited by space and location – as well as your definition of ‘wildlife’. Birds are an obvious group of animals you can encourage and support with your garden, but there’s lots of other wildlife you can help that you might otherwise overlook.
Invertebrates – beetles, butterflies, moths, hoverflies and bees – all need somewhere to hibernate in winter. Some hibernate as adults, some as larvae (i.e. caterpillars) and some as eggs. By creating a complex and varied structure in your garden, you’re creating lots of opportunity for things to tuck away in the winter. Then there’s the wildlife we don’t really think of as proper “wildlife”. Fungi, lichens, plants… even slime moulds!
Perhaps one of the most overlooked groups of wildlife is our plant life. It’s easy to dismiss our native wildflowers as simply ‘weeds’, and instead opt for something colourful from the garden centre. But by letting native plants establish, or managing your garden to be a low-nutrient place, you’ll open the door for loads of green creatures.
Wildflowers, climbers, shrubs and ferns; all with their own amazing natural histories. Where native plants thrive, so do insects, and therefore birds. When you start with encouraging a good variety of plant life, It’s kind of like building a mini-ecosystem.
What are the biggest threats to wildlife over winter?
In a natural environment, cold weather is the biggest obstacle wildlife must navigate each winter. Small critters are most susceptible to this – and their population spikes and troughs are closely linked with warmer or colder years. It’s thought to be partly why we’re seeing some species, like Long Tailed Tits, increasing in numbers as we see our climate change and winters get warmer.
Making a garden or green space a textured space with lots of nooks and crannies, as well as sources of water and natural food, will help support birdlife in particular through the colder months. Try not to be tempted to cut all vegetation back at the end of summer.
Leaving a little bit of bushiness, especially things like shrubs and trees, will provide valuable sources of winter berries for birds – species like Hawthorn bring a pop of colour to late Autumn and early Winter and are loved by thrushes. Leaving things like thistles and teasels provide natural seed sources for birds like goldfinches. The joy I get from watching a flock of their little jam-dipped faces scoffing from the seedheads against the winter sun is almost unbeatable.
What are your top tips for making a garden wildlife friendly?
- Texture: make sure there’s shelter, nooks and crannies to hide in, and plenty of spots for insects to hibernate, and birds to roost. A dense shrub or log pile can be several degrees warmer than outside – the difference between life and death!
- Water: water sources can freeze over in a cold snap, so making sure water remains unfrozen, or keeping water running, is helpful for lots of wildlife.
- Hold back on the secateurs: leaving some wild bits of vegetation can provide food for birds, like berries and wild seeds (essentially a natural bird feeder). It’s also places for insects to nestle away and hibernate.
What habitats can you create in your garden to help wildlife?
Making your garden ‘wildlife friendly’ can open the door for a huge array of species, and it can be done without having to purchase trinkets, tools and gimmicks. Birdbaths can be made out of anything – a dish, a plant tray, or even digging a mini pond with a shallow edge.
Birdfeeders are another thing you can make yourself. Seed feeders and suet feeders are essentially mimicking natural sources of food. By creating a garden that supports wild forms of food – seeds, berries and insects, you’re making it into one big bird feeder!
Encouraging the lesser-loved wildlife is also quite easy. Wildlife is attracted to decay; nature is a very efficient recycler. Creating deadwood habitats – either log piles, or standing deadwood – creates a haven for fungi and insects, and it’s fascinating.
How does all this help the wider ecosystem of the garden?
The more wildlife you can welcome into your garden, the more layers of complexity, intricacy and beauty you can weave. Nature is all about relationship and interaction – dances between predator and prey, parasites and hosts, plants and their pollinators.
We have the amazing opportunity, and arguably duty, to support wildlife in the spaces we live. In doing so, we also get to learn about it, which is both a huge joy and privilege. We instinctively know winter is a harsh time of year – we feel it ourselves in the cold, wet darkness of it. Why wouldn’t we want to make the green spaces we care for friendlier and warmer to the wildlife they could support?
