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Here's a thing. If a wild animal comes into a garden, it's wildlife. If a wild plant comes in, it's a weed. Now that seems just a bit unfair on our native flora.Admittedly, an animal can be considered a pest, but many are regarded as helpful

Due to the wet weather of the past week, I haven't been out in the garden much. The snails, however, have been very active; I can barely walk to the front gate without the familiar sound of snails crunching underfoot. Most of the plants we grow

quantities per m³ of estimated water volume. Since the park was revamped a year or so ago it is a delightful place to wander, but the pond was always the low point. There are now recently installed baskets of water plants (more needed I think), and wire

and small shrubs, and the birds were sitting on one of the tough child-resistant plants.They were oblivious to the excited line of boys and girls trotting past to class, but continued to explore the branches only a couple of metres from the children

, using railway sleepers, three high (about 50 cm), to make a raised water body. Triangular in shape, 2 metres long, with a deep corner dug down a further 50 cm and a shallow corner for marginal plants. Three species of damselfly, two species of dragonfly

of Box Hill, in Surrey.Although box, Buxus sempervirens, is widely planted in gardens, Box Hill is one of the few places in Britain (along with Boxted in Kent) where it is thought to be a true native. Gonocerus had been found there, on and off, for about

, commuters, joggers and roller bladers (even though there are signs saying not to, but hey - this is Paris). There's lots going on but I have to admit that there are not many signs of wildlife. The plants are fastidiously tended and the borders manicured

and widespread, but more an insect of rough flowery grassland, verges, meadows and commons than of domestic gardens. The larvae burrow in plant stems, but only wild flowers so it's never a pest. It's easy to see how this noble-looking beetle got its scientific

. It didn't move, other than the odd belch and my 2½-year-old son looked at it askance, not completely convinced it was a living creature. I could hear his mind working - it was much more likely to be a curiously sculpted rock, or a stunted plant root. We

. There is nothing about taking out Leyland cypresses, unless, perhaps by so doing I "increase the proportion of native plant and tree species". Ah, but I can get the pupils to build a hibernaculum for amphibians with the logs and retain the dead wood for timber