Boost the bottom of the food chain by supporting beneficial insects, and the rest of your GARDEN ECOSYSTEM will thrive
6 EASY PROJECTS TO DO NOW!
Simple & stylish!
CREATE A STYLISH SLATE NOOKERY
We spotted this fab set-up at the Stone Illusions stall at RHS Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival 2023 and it’s such a clever idea. You can use any shallow vessel (drill plenty of drainage holes in it if it doesn’t already have any) or treat yourself to a Staddle Stone Planter (from £54, stoneillusions.co.uk), and it’ll house lots of pest-munching insects. Adding a few low-growing alpine plants will feed butterflies and bees as well as look nice!
Place a piece of slate over each hole. Add enough compost so that the top of the slate pieces will sit flush with the lip when pushed in. Arrange the slate pieces on their edges, packing them tightly together and pushing a little into the compost just enough to secure, in natural-looking rows or strata. Leave a few gaps to fill with compost and plant the alpines, water and place in a sheltered sunny position, but out of hot, burning sunshine.
WHAT IT COST
✽ Slate pieces: Blue Slate 40mm, £13.99/20kg loadsofstone.com
✽ Compost: John Innes Compost No.3, £7.99/28L marshallsgarden.com
✽ Plants: Easy Alpine Collection, £20/10 plants icealpines.co.uk TOTAL: £41.98
WHAT IT COST
✽ Soil improver: 2 x Westland Bio-Life, £7.99/50L marshallsgarden.com
✽ Controlled-release fertiliser: Miracle-Gro Continuous Release Plant Food, £6/900g tesco.com
✽ 7 x bareroot beech hedging plants, £1.89 each/60-90cm plants hedgesdirect.co.uk
TOTAL: £35.21/3m hedge
TIP
A hedge does wonders for front-garden kerb appeal, or why not plant a short length as a divider or screen?
SWAP A FENCE FOR A HEDGE
A hedge is a wonderful wildlife oasis, attracting a myriad of useful and beneficial insects and creepy-crawlies, as well as garden birds that will feed and nest there. And now is the perfect time to plant one, with plants available as cheaper bareroots.
For maximum benefit, choose a native. Our pick is beech as it’s so compact. Although it’s deciduous, the striking leaves stay put all through winter, which is great for sheltering wildlife but also looks good too. And the added benefit of choosing native is that they’re usually cheaper – our beech bareroots cost just £1.89 each!
The secret to hedge success is good soil prep. Dig a trench the length of the hedge, 60cm wide and deep enough to accommodate the roots without bending them. Mix soil improver or compost, and fertiliser, with the dug-out soil.
Line the plants up at their correct spacing (for most hedging plants this is 45-60cm apart). Then fill in the trench with the excavated
