Rewilding the field!

Okay so the title of this blog is probably a tiny bit misleading… well… at the moment anyway!  As you know I spend a lot of time inspecting what is in the field and the garden next to the field.  I love the view through the garden gate into the ‘secret garden’ of the field beyond.  

As my knowledge has increased I have noticed this year how ecologically barren the field really is.  Yes the field margins look lush and green, but if you look closely there is very little diversity in the plant life.  So I have taken it upon myself to ‘rewild’ it a little.

Now the farmer that rents the field sprays it with what we assume are insecticides and herbicides, from what we can tell he uses direct spraying so hopefully it won’t destroy all of what I am trying to create.  I should add that the owner of the field has given me permission to work on a patch of the field to see how it goes.  The patch I have decided to use is just outside the garden fence.  There are a few of reasons for this A) easy access B) the farmer can’t cut it down before they harvest the crop as the combine can’t cut that close to the corner! and C) it is full of common nettles and cleavers. 

To start work I had to clear a path through the nettles and cleavers to be able to actually get out into the field.

I then began to clear the cleavers doing my best to leave as many nettles and cow parsley as I could; I did discover that although I thought there were lots of nettles, there wasn’t, it really was all cleavers.

Pulling the cleavers up revealed no life underneath them at all, it was just soil.  I did feel bad pulling up the greenery as it looked horrendous leaving bare soil; however I know, if all goes to plan, the results will be better for our pollinators than leaving it as it is. 

A few weeks ago I moved a prickly sow-thistle from the garden and put it out in the field.  I was pleased to see it survived its move and was even in flower, I was more pleased when a bee came along and had a look at it.  It dawned on me that the only obvious flowers in the field were the cow parsley.  I am hoping that as summer progresses I will see more of a variety appear but I don’t hold out a lot of hope. 

I thought I was going to clear a ‘good patch’ of field margin but when it came to it I cleared a little patch!  Partly this decision was down to the fact that everything I was pulling up had to fit in the garden waste bin!  It was already partly full and what I had removed would have filled it three fold!

However the little patch was enough for me to make a start, I planted out some teasels and cornflowers to see how they fared.  I decided five of each would do, as if they didn’t take to their new home I didn’t want to kill lots in one go! 

When I checked on them the next day they looked quite happy 🙂  I do plan on watching the field more closely this year to see what plants naturally occur, then maybe next year I can boost their numbers by growing more from seed!  I may need a bigger greenhouse!

In the next week or so I will be planting out more teasels, cornflowers, oxeye daisy, common fleabane and red campion and maybe even clearing some more space!     

My Patch – April 2019

April 3rd – This morning in the garden there were two robins, long-tailed tits and the starlings were clicking up on the roof.  

April 10th – some late afternoon sun brought out the bees and a 7-spot ladybird.  Unfortunately I didn’t get very clear photos of the bees so not sure which ones they were!  I still find them confusing.


April 11th – This evening I got a chance to take a short walk around the field.  The male fallow deer were located out in the centre of the field, I think they are starting to get used to me as they don’t react too much now.  I was hoping I would start to find some flowers in the field but its either too early or too many herbicides have been sprayed so they haven’t had a chance to develop yet.  I did find a lone lesser celandine.  In the garden there is a male goat willow tree, in the field down near next doors garden, is what I believe to be a female goat willow.  

The birds that nest around the house have been much more visible around their nest sites, the jackdaws are in the chimneys and the starlings are taking nesting material into the roof 🙂

There was a bee checking out holes in the garden wall this evening, it has taken me a while to figure out, but I have finally narrowed it down to being a hairy-footed flower bee.  The first one I have ever seen 🙂 

April 15th – this morning I found my first brimstone moth, just sat on the wall outside the front door!  

April 18th – Whilst tidying the raised bed I noticed all the small creatures starting to appear in the vegetation.  The first one I spotted was apion frumentarium, next up was a tiny dark bush-cricket (Pholidoptera griseoaptera) and then a clover mite.  My last discovery of the day was a phalangium opilio spider.  I had never seen any of them before so this evening I had to do some research into what they all were!

Now I seem to have missed the nesting season this year!  I don’t know how; has all just happened earlier this year? or have I just been occupied with  growing plants and missed it? today I saw a starling take food into his nest!  Tomorrow I aim to pay a little more attention and train my camera on the nest hole to see exactly what is going on.  

April 19th – The starlings are 100% feeding in the nests at the back of the house, I watched both parents visit one after the other.  They both had at least two items of food in their beaks.  

There were more 7-spot ladybirds in the garden this afternoon and an orange-tip butterfly landed on the garlic mustard 🙂

April 20th – today I was concentrating on concreting the patio, however I couldn’t miss the common frog that hopped out of a hole underneath the raised bed and off across the patio.  He had been disturb as I had put sand over the top of him as I was filling in a hole and I hadn’t seen him!  I moved him up next to the small pond so he could hide under the plants.  

April 21st – there was a moth on the window, a Lunar marbled brown (Drymonia ruficornis).  I got out in the field for a walk this morning.  I heard my first cuckoo of the year – it is so nice to know he has returned safely.  I didn’t notice a lot of other birds, I don’t know if it was because I seemed to be noticing the insects or they just didn’t seem to be about.  I did have a companion with me who does make more noise than me when walking so it could have been a factor!  I did hear a woodpecker drumming.  

Since I have been following #Wildflowerhour on Twitter my botanical skills have improved greatly.  It is nice to be able to identify my finds without now having to spend hours trying to figure out what they are!  I want to take note this year of what is growing in the field so that next year I might be able to add to the population by growing them from seed and planting them out.  Today I identified, ground-ivy, red dead-nettle, cuckooflower and garlic mustard in the copse.  I was pleased to see the amount of garlic mustard there was as I know in the copse it won’t be cut down when the crop is harvested, hopefully it also explains the orange-tips who were darting around close by.  I need to go for a wander amongst it to see what else is growing in there!  

The time I save not having to look up flowers is definitely spent on the insects and arachnids!  After a lot of work identifying (I hope correctly) I found; Helophilus pendulus, Cucumber spider, Corizus hyoscyami, nomada sp. unknown, Nursery Web Spider, notostira elongata, Eupeodes sp. unknown, Pied Shieldbug (Tritomegas bicolor) on host plant white dead-nettle, Yellow Dung Fly (Scathophaga stercoraria), Flesh Fly (Sarcophaga carnaria), what I think is a pterostichus cupreus eating a harpalus affinis, Peacock butterfly and my first Dark-edged Bee-fly (Bombylius major) of the year!

When walking back up past the copse the fallow deer appeared in front of us.  They decided that is was safe enough to run out of the copse and into the field stopping a safe distance away.  I like these types of encounters 🙂

April 24th – I’m sure I saw a swallow this evening; I don’t think I was imagining it but it was only a fleeting glimpse.  I happened to take a photo of the garlic mustard and only noticed afterwards that there is a orange-tip egg on it 🙂 I hope we have some more.  It is nice to know that all I am trying to do with the garden is helping some of the garden visitors.   

April 25th – The starling chicks at the front of the house have started calling – across the garden and the neighbouring house I think there are now three starling nests with calling chicks. 

April 29th – The field was being sprayed when I got there this evening; I assume with pesticides. The male fallow deer who were resting in the middle of the field didn’t move until the machinery was two runs away from them. They ran off but then stopped short of the copse, they eventually disappeared.  The starlings are still calling and I heard the cuckoo again this evening 🙂

 

My Patch – A Garden update: April 2019

This month I have concentrated on trying to get the garden into a tidier/cleaner state for the planting out of the flowers when they are ready.  It has meant a lot of work so other aspects have suffered a little! 

April 1st – the basil has started to grow 🙂

April 2nd – as it is meant to be frosty for the next few nights I thought I would leave my cowslips and garlic mustard outside to ‘chill’.  They are meant to have a period of cold to start germination so I thought it can’t do them any harm as they don’t seem to be doing anything anyway! I tidied a little more of the glasshouse and found another five terracotta pots I will be able to use.  They will all need a bit of a clean, I just need to work out if I have any shorter plants which I can put in them; probably birdsfoot trefoil and sweet williams.

April 8th – tonight I potted on some of the sweet pea, sunflowers and borage.  I know I should have probably potted on the sweet peas earlier but I wasn’t sure where to pot them on too!  I knew I needed a deeper pot, I still have more that need rescuing from their small trays.  

Last year I removed a purple/red coloured steamed plant from the raised bed as it was in the way of the bird feeder!  I put it in a pot as no one knew what it was – thanks to @porridgebrain on Twitter who posted an image of her peonies I discovered what it was! It is still alive! I have removed all of ‘weeds’ from its pot and moved it to a sunnier spot – I plan to put it back into the raised bed but in a more suitable location.  

April 9th – This evening I decided I needed to take some images of the garden before I started to tidy/clean.  It does look a bit of a mess and its starting to make me stressed!  I know gardening isn’t meant to create stress it is meant to reduce it, but when there is so much to do it gets a bit much.  

I also potted on more of the borage and removed the ‘weeds’ from all the pots in the left garden.  The mint looks much better now I can actually see it is growing; I think it will need to be re potted this year.

April 10th – I finished potting on all of the borage today; I think I should have potted them on when they were a little smaller.  I have 73 plants in total.  I was going to sow some more though I think that will probably be more than enough for this year! 

April 11th – my common fleabane has started to sprout 🙂

I have only just thought about taking photos of my seedlings so I know what they look like in future years – I hope the flowers will seed themselves in the garden so next year I need to know what they look like so I know what is growing!

April 12th – So today I jet washed the left side of the garden’s patio; it only took 10 hours!!

April 15th – the mint has started to grow 😊  I have sown more rudbeckia as for some reason it hasn’t germinated.  

April 16th – sowed red campion, tall marigolds (I collected seed form the garden last year so I don’t know exactly what they are!) and perennial flax seed which I also collected from the garden.  

April 18th – painted the left fence, ‘weeded’ the raised bed and one of the love-in-the-mist has sprouted.

April 19th – was also a busy day, I moved the garlic mustard from growning in the right hand patio to the raised bed in the hope that it will survive, jet washed the patio, looked at repairing the garage guttering so a water butt can be fitted; we had to remove one of the branches from the hazel tree as it had caused the guttering to break.  I also potted on 62 cornflowers, potted on the rest of the sweet peas and put up a bee hotel 🙂

April 20th – I concreted 90% of the right hand patio – it took all day!

April 24th – Potted on 37 cornflowers and  33 teasel, the marigolds, red campion and the new batch of cornflowers and rudbeckia have sprouted.  I wasn’t expecting the perennial flax to germinate but it is doing quite well.

April 25th – Potted on 36 teasel and 21 sunflowers.

April 26th – Tonight I tweeted a photo of a tiny daffodil looking flower that is located in one of the window boxes.  @Mark_Couper replied to let me know they are daffodils; a variety called ‘new baby’. At least now I know what to do with them when they are relocated out of the window box, as at the moment they are surrounded by ‘weeds’ and very little compost!  

April 27th – today I visited a nursery sale with my Mum.  We went last year; this year I was going with a list of what I wanted to buy.  I managed to find only one plant on my list echinacea, I did also buy martin’s spurge as I thought it would look nice against the green of the fence and also add some foliage in the winter as I believe it is evergreen.   

April 29th – tonight I concreted where my potted plants are going to go so I will be able to start moving them about later in the week.  It will be nice to know some are planted up and are ready to just grow!  I have a few large pots that I assume had shrubs delivered in them, the pots have been kept for years so I have started to utilise them.  They aren’t the most attractive; black with handles on the them but I intend to hide them behind the more ‘attractive’ pots!  Tonight I put some borage in one of them.  I have probably made a mistake when putting 3 plants in one pot as I have read they can grow rather large, I think it might just be trial and error this year!  I also thought I probably needed to plant out the Martin’s spurge as their roots were coming out of the bottom of the pots.  I know they will expand and fill the pot; maybe when they do they can be separated into two pots.  By potting the plants out it meant I had some more small pots I could then use for potting on the remaining sunflowers 🙂 

Also throughout this month… the strawberries, field forget-me-not, garlic mustard, red campion, lilac and choisya ternata have all started to flower 🙂 

So far this year; total number of plants grown from seed and potted on…
99 cornflowers
73 borage
27 sunflowers
69 teasel