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How to invite wildlife into your garden – Eccleston Homes

March 17th, 2017

Here at Eccleston Homes all of our houses are designed to be eco-friendly inside and out, and that includes ensuring that all the lovely wildlife has somewhere to live. Here’s a few ways to can make your garden as welcoming as possible.

• Did you know that there are 17 species of bats in the UK? To help encourage safe habitats for these remarkable little mammals, all of our homes come with an enclosed bat box, allowing bats to create a natural home within the cavity of the building.

• Composting your garden waste helps all your garden plants and wildlife as it speeds up the natural recycling of nutrients by harnessing native decomposer organisms (saprophytes), especially fungi and soil bacteria.

• Birds, in particular swifts, have been making their homes in traditional man-made buildings since Roman times. However as times as moved on and building techniques have modernised, birds have found it increasingly difficult to nest due to builders now sealing the eaves. Eco-friendly bird boxes are now available with most new build homes and act as an enclosed nesting box.

• If you don’t have room for, or don’t want, a full-scale wildflower meadow, simply allowing patches of lawn to grow longer will provide shelter. For small mammals, such as wood mice, voles and shrews, tend to be attracted to thid type of habitat and will provide food for some butterfly caterpillars – as not all of these eat cabbages or nettles, contrary to popular belief.

• Sustainability is an environmental buzzword that simply means minimising your use of finite resources (such as oil) in favour of natural processes. Synthetic pesticides are not only toxic to more than the target organisms, they are extremely energy intensive to produce, so employ them as a last resort wherever possible. Avoid peat-based composts, choose sustainably-sourced wood for patio furniture, recycle all you can, and save water wherever possible – these are all more sustainable forms of gardening. It will help ensure that your garden treads lightly on the world.