Top tips for rewilding your garden
Last week I visited the walled garden at Knepp. Find out how they have rewilded the garden and how you can boost biodiversity in your own outdoor space, however small.
The Knepp Estate must be one of the best known examples of rewilding in the country. A couple of years ago the Estate turned their attention to the rather traditional walled garden with a kitchen garden and greenhouse. Out went the traditional croquet lawn and herbaceous beds and in their place, tonnes of crushed building waste. To increase the topographical complexity, the waste was landscaped into troughs and peaks, created many different habitats that would support a greater range of species. There was also a patchwork of planting materials that suit different plants and help to boost diversity further. As you would imagine. the planting plan was also complex and around 900 species of plant were included to kick start the process. Masterminding the rewilding were Tom Stuart Smith, James Hitchmough, Mick Crawley, and Jekka McVicar.
It is now a wonderful example of how you can boost biodiversity in a managed environment, such as a garden, and it has so many ideas that are applicable to virtually every garden.
I first visited Knepp during the drought of 2022 when the garden was newly planted. I went on one of the very first garden safaris and the day was blistering hot and sunny. The potential of the project was clear to see and you can read how enthused I was in my blog. I have tried to include photos in this post photographed from similar positions so you can see the transformation over the last two years.
Following on from the summer drought, the garden experienced a winter that was mostly mild but with an extremely cold spell and since then virtually endless rain. So it really has been challenging for the plants, some have thrived, others have disappeared. But as we were reminded frequently, death of a plant is not a failure.
Garden Masterclass
This workshop was organised by Garden Masterclass and was led by James Hitchmough and Head Gardener Charlie Harper.
So much was covered on the day re the planting in the walled garden, but I want to focus on biodiversity. James did a brilliant session in the afternoon looking at the drivers of biodiversity gain. He gave us lots of ideas to boost biodiversity, so I have picked five which I feel could be applied to the smallest urban garden as well as a large rural one.
5 ways to boost biodiversity
The most important thing to remember is that you need to have ‘more stuff’ !!!
1. Reduce the size of the lawn by 50% So many people want a lawn in their garden and may feel that a lawn is essential, so an effective compromise is to get rid of half the lawn and replacing it with ‘stuff’
2. Maximise the volume of leaves in the garden, so you have more surfaces. More surfaces = more space for life.
3. Create more special complexity by adding more layers in your planting. Think trees and shrubs, more understorey, and low growing, ground covering plants. The more diverse the layers, the more niches and more species. I was thinking how you might achieve this in a small urban garden or even a terrace through the clever use of containers. You can plant them with a diverse mix of plants of differing heights for example, some tall specimen plants, others with shorter plants and trailing plants etc. If you group the pots together you can create quite a complex and varied habitat.
4. More taxonomic complexity i.e. increase the range of plants you grow, with representatives from lots of different plant families etc - again its a driver because there is more choice for insects and this is totally possible to achieve in a small garden. Just don’t have lots of the same plant, but create as big a mix of species as possible, checking, of course, that they are suitable to your space.
5. Add water. One to easiest ways of boosting biodiversity is have a standing water in your green space, either a small water feature or a larger pond. Water brings in insects so quickly, and this can be followed by useful animals, such as dragonflies, frogs and toads.
There is a theme running through this – complexity – have a good mix of layers, a variety of species. I think I would add floral diversity to this list too – having lots of different type of flowers to suit a wide a range of insects as possible for as long as possible through the year. I wrote about this earlier this year, showing how important weeds were in my garden. Check out this post
Something to think about
There is a continual debate re the use of natives and non natives which I’ll not dive into here, other than to say that I feel we should be a little more relaxed about this as climate change has the potential to make life difficult for a lot of native species, so perhaps we need to be more broad minded in our approach.
But James suggested that if you are going to use a native plant, prioritise those species that are poor at distributing their seed and, therefore, can take a while to spread. For example, the cowslip Primula veris. It’s a long lived plant, but its not a great coloniser as its seed doesn’t spread very far – some research papers suggest its just half a metre!”
Another point to consider – if you have a limited space in your garden, don’t bother growing those ubiquitous plants ie those common plants that we see growing every where. It you don’t have much space, focus on growing something that will help to boost your biodiversity. James’ example was nettles. They are found everywhere, so if you don’t have much space, don’t bother with them as the biodiversity gain from having them will be limited, so much better to use the space for something more unusual.
Also don’t forget that many insects like bare ground, especially ground nesting insects so make sure you have bare, open spaces to support some of the early solitary bees etc.
West Dean
My trip to Sussex included a visit to West Dean after 20 years and once I have dug out my photos from the previous visit, I’ll do a post. Meanwhile, here’s a photo of the delphinium trial which was amazing.
And, while I know its raining again ………….. you can listen to a podcast that I did with Garden Organic on being water wise in the garden.
Happy Gardening
Sally
Diary of talks and webinars
Talk 15th June If you are at Gardner’s World Live on Saturday don’t forget to look out for Kim is speaking at the Urban Garden stage
Talk 2 July Sally is giving a talk to Calne Garden Club
Talk 4 July Both Sally and Kim are speaking at RHS Hampton Court. Sally’s slot is 4pm on the Thursday and Kim on Sunday, both of us are on the How To stage
Talk 7 July Sally is giving a talk at the London Permaculture Festival
Talk 23 July Sally is giving a talk to Wedmore Garden Club
Talk 13 September Talk by Sally at Yeo Valley Gardens, Organic September Specials, the garden is nr Bristol
Sally and Kim give talks on a wide range of topics. Please get in touch if you would like to arrange a talk or webinar.