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). But I feel it's only a matter of time before they find it. The only birds visiting my garden at the moment are a blackbird, robin and several pigeons. Blackbirds and robins are ground feeders, so I leave food on the ground for them. I put it out first

, is even more perfect than Maggie Smith), Clive Owen and David Kelly (whom older readers will remember as the one-armed Irish washer up in Robin's Nest). Based on a true story it follows a group of convicts who discover a passion for gardening

March is not really prime garden visiting time: a few gardens with specialist collections are open for the wonderful National Gardens Scheme, but most of them are keeping their powder dry in readiness for spring and summer.However, gardeners still

noticed, except the butterflies, of course, and the blackbirds and the robin and the frogs.I can see the benefits of having an artificial lawn, a lawn that stays green and lush under trees and in between goal posts, that you don't have to get up to mow

and watering the birds. Recent visitors include 32 sparrows, three robins, masses of assorted tits and hordes of blackbirds, all happily feasting on the hedge in front of our house.Before light the blackbirds are feasting on the cut apples, bird seed and fat

windfalls are left beneath trees for blackbirds to peck at.Hedges and thick shrubs provide shelter and nesting sites - I could show you at least four sites around my garden where sparrows, blackbirds, robin and wren (I think) nested last year. Water

imported topsoil, then tried (and failed) to sow a lawn from seed.I watched the evolution of the plot from courtyard to garden as more and more creatures visited it - blue tits and great tits, a robin, blackbird, bumblebees, butterflies, moths, slugs

frosts.My garden in East London hasn't seen rain since before Christmas. We've had snow, of course, and the promise of rain - dark clouds, even a thunder storm, but no water (we did have a two minute shower last Friday but it by the time I recognised

Some of my earliest memories are of going to stay with my grandparents in Scotland. Every afternoon my grandfather would wander off to sit on a bench and feed the birds. He had a tin filled with peanuts in his waistcoat pocket, and robins and tits

right away.3. Insulate outside tapNot only must I turn off the stopcock to my garden tap to isolate the water supply (mine is almost hidden behind pipework under the kitchen sink), but I must wrap insulation material round the brass tap itself. Again, I