My wild garden

I love granjura's wild garden - she is my expert on all things horticultural (my daughter is her equivalent in NZ and is becoming very knowledgable about the local species.). I suppose the mountains are my garden now - I have only a balcony because I am away from home so much. I tried to identify some of the wide range of flowers on my walk yesteday, but I gave up and decided just to enjoy them. There were bushes covered in dog roses and I found my first wild strawberry (fraise des bois) of the season. l love foraging! I haven't seen any bluebells here but there are some lovely blue/violet bell shaped flowers - hare bells? The flashes of blue I see everywhere are forget-me-nots.
My sister has a very small back garden , about as big as her living room, but she gets immense pleasure from it and it is a riot of colour. She never buys plants but swaps them with the other keen gardeners in her women's group.
She has a buddleia to attract the butterflies and has even managed to keep a little uncultivated spot to attract the birds.

Alternatively, put some old carpet over it for a time to see what's at soil level.
we did that too and planted some things, but the natives resettled .

Mow it, rake it, leave it, and see what happens, glass. That's what I did. Had to start with a scythe (you'll need a 'ditch blade'; can lend you a book if you're interested). I suppose a strimmer would do (noisy things).

I am wanting to set a banked area in our garden over to a wild garden, at the moment it resembles moorland. Does anyone have any tips on where to start?

There are lots of references to it on the net. You can apparently buy it to plant a lawn, but I cannot imagine where - it is so tiny you would go home with almost nothing.

It is very pretty indeed and we walk all over it and it just bounces back up - I feel very lucky to have it - especially as it has just popped up from nowhere. And we are hopeless ignorant gardeners, so anything that takes care of itself and looks so lovely gets my vote!

Along with the forest of ox-eye daisies that have appeared from nowhere, we have been very lucky this year.

I'm envious too, Mishap. I wonder if it would do well in a gravel garden?

Oh, how lovely, mishap. I'm envious! We had a bit of that between flagstones at our Oxfordshire house and it was always one of my favourites. Enjoy!

I wonder if I could get it to grow here?

I have identified it! I picked a flower and compared it with lots of other images on the web. I could see it was not speedwell because of the way it grows on individual stems and the fact that it has 5 slim petals, not 4 fat ones.

So.....it is Isotoma fluviatilis - otherwise know as Blue Star Creeper. Apparently in the US some people deliberately plant it as a lawn because it does not need mowing and does not need much water - so I will just let it take over I think as I love it!

Ginger plants are a weed in New Zealand.

We went to the Huntingdon Gardens near Los Angeles a few years back. Just amazing. But then we discovered a corner entitled wild English garden - with a few miserable native perenials and yes, a patch of dandelions, lol.
And when we went on from there to Maui (Hawai)and Kaui- we were admiring the profusion of huge ginger plants with the most amazing flowers, and the 'natives' were complaining that they grow like weed!

It's like straight hair versus curly - we are never satisfied! Must say that with advancing years I am becoming much more philosophical about both - plants and hair - and accept that what will grow best here is best, and to stop battling against nature.

Bags, I once saw a dandelion plant for sale in the herb section of a garden centre. I thought it might be a joke but it had a label on it and seemed serious. Dandelion coffee anyone?

If dandelions were rare, we'd all want them in our lawns.

Like that, Mishap!

Would your 'blue' lawn be made up of Creeping Charlie (ground ivy)? - Although the tiny flowers are more soft mauve than blue. It's a very busy ground plant and loves to be mowed in order to spread! Probably Speedwell though.

mishap Lovely! and quite so!

The flowers are very tiny indeed, and so close to the ground that the mower misses them. I will take a pic of them and see if I can upload the photo so the keen gardeners can take a look and might be able to identify it. I woul love to know what they are.
The muse took hold again!......

The Perfect Lawn

Now why would you want a perfect lawn?
Folks may say it looks fantastic
But without the daisies and speedwell and clover
You might just as well roll out some plastic.

Yes flowerfriend, bats should definitely stay outside. All this stuff about their being small, furry creatures who are more scared of you than you are of them is just so much hogwash as far as I am concerned when a bat and I share the same room. or even the same house. We used to have them roosting in the flat roof above our bedroom in a previous house, and you would not believe the racket they made all night. It sounded as if they spent the entire time throwing stones and shouting at each other from the thumping noises on the ceiling and the bird-like chattering. At least if they do get in they are more intelligent than your average bird and can find their way through an open window, but still, I do think that, like spiders, they should remain OUTSIDE.

As a bat lover I salute you. However I really dislike them coming into the house.

Shame - but I'm afraid it's called 'nature'. We had many cases in our large garden of hedgehogs with hind legs missing or half bitten off. Two had to be put down, but Eileen was able to 'repair' the others and find them enclosed gardens, away from foxes.

The bat expert explained why he came to visit last night. He has been doing a study of habitats in the area with Google earth, and found we had the only natural pond in the Commune. He had a look and said such ponds are paramount for the survival of bats, and asked us to keep vegetation low at each end so that they could swoop and take off un-hindered. Hurrah.

Wild forget-me-nots grow quite tall. Well mine do.

Oh I love a wild garden and do often envy those that have them and yours sounds wonderfulBags but I have a tiny garden. Somehow tiny gardens have to be reasonably tidy. A friend who has two hectares one of which by choice is totally wild has nightingales each late spring and summer. Incidentally when I say tiny I do mean tiny.

Once found a dead hedgehog in my Edinburgh garden. It had one bite (small dog/fox sized) taken out of its side: and strange.

Yes, granjura - that's all we found of our resident hedgehog....

Are you sure it was a hedgehog jess? Not foxes mating?

jeni

I on the other hand was known as the 'badger lady' - I knew every single badger set and used to keep an eye on lamping, digging and baiting activities.
If a badger does get a hedgehog, I'm afraid it is very quick! All you will find is the skin and spikes, inside out.