How can your home help local wildlife?

This time of year, when it’s hard to imagine the warmer weather and longer days to come, is the perfect time to start planning ways in which your home and garden could enhance and protect local wildlife.

Many planning applications for building projects are granted with conditions attached to ensure measures are taken to protect biodiversity. Many of our customers are keen to protect local wildlife when they can anyway and look on this as part of the attraction of building a home in the country, complete with a beautiful garden. We often fit bat and bird boxes to our new homes.

If you are starting to custom build a bespoke new house from scratch, with a little thought, it’s easy to build in protection and an enhanced environment for local wildlife right from the start. If you are happy in your current home, why not see what you can do to benefit the local birds, bees and other animal and plant life this year?

Going bats about bats

Many people would be astonished to learn that we have at least 17 species of bat breeding in the UK, which is almost a quarter of our native mammal species.  From the largest – the greater mouse eared bat – to the smallest, the common pipistrelle, which only weighs as much as a 2p coin, bats are remarkable animals. To help support these amazing creatures, providing secure spaces for them to roost and breed is simple. Bat boxes are easy to install and come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Different ones are available for summer and winter use, some are designed with baby bats in mind and some are just a simple roosting space, suitable for a variety of different bat species. Find out more from the the Bat Conservation Trust.

Birdwatching could be a new hobby

Over lockdown, many of us discovered the simple pleasure to be found from watching nature literally on our doorstep, or at least just outside the window. There are 574 bird species to be found in the UK and while you are unlikely to see quite that many species in your garden, you will have a good chance of seeing at least 20 or so, especially if you do what you can to encourage them by providing somewhere safe to nest and feed.

Just like bat boxes, nest boxes are easy to install and again come in a variety of sizes. If you are tech-savvy and really want to maximise your birdwatching enjoyment, why not install a nest box camera and enjoy all the drama of a clutch of eggs hatching and baby birds being fed and learning to fly, all from the comfort of your armchair? Those of us who are less technically minded, will still get huge enjoyment just from feeding birds in our garden. Put up a simple bird table and make sure you keep it well stocked, especially in the colder months. Don’t forget to take part in this year’s Big Garden Bird Watch too.

Making a splash with a garden pond

A garden pond can form a delightful feature of your home.. Digging one from scratch can be quite a major undertaking. If you don’t want to go that far, any container of water will be appreciated by local wildlife needing somewhere to drink and splash. It will encourage newts, frogs and a whole host of insects to take up residence too. Make sure your ‘pond’ has a sloping side and some shallow water for the smallest visitors – even bees appreciate staying hydrated!

Bee helpful to local wildlife

Bees have featured in the news a lot recently as their numbers are plummeting. Planting a bee-friendly garden is one of the most positive projects you could start this year. There are a huge number of bee -friendly flowers and plants. Purple flowers are their favourite, but sunflowers, bluebells, salvias and cosmos are popular too. Rosemary and chives will attract scores of bees and will be useful in the kitchen too. If you like to grow your own vegetables, make sure you include onions, peppers and beans, as bees will particularly appreciate these. Overuse of pesticides is the main reason that bee numbers are in decline, so use natural products where you can.

Trees form an important part of landscaping around your home. Any fruit tree, especially apple and cherry will attract bees. So, if you are planning on including trees in your plans, try and add these into your design.

Home sweet home for wildlife too

You can easily make your own simple bee house or they are readily available in garden centres or on line. They should be constructed so the entrance points face downwards to let the bees get in and keep the rain out.

It’s always worth leaving a patch to grow wild in your garden if you have the space. Just letting one patch of grass grow long by mowing it less frequently will help support bees as it will give two of their favourite flowers, dandelions and clover, a chance to grow. Leaving a patch of longer grass also provides a hiding place for little mammals like wood mice, voles and shrews too. Find out more about creating a perfect wildlife garden here.

Get in touch with us today to find out how we can help you turn your self-building dream of a new home into reality.