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woodpeckers, witnessed blackbirds and robins fighting over territory, and sat a little too close to a wasps' nest.It's generally a very good habitat for wildlife: there's a mass of ivy to provide food and shelter for all manner of creatures, and something

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

will be reduced, while caterpillar food plants could die through lack of water, taking the caterpillars (and therefore butterflies) with them. The dry, hard ground will make life hard for robins and blackbirds looking for worms to feed themselves and their young

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

them circling over the compost heaps up at the local allotments, or settled chewing bark on a tree trunk. Then a few days ago I saw one flying in the street, examining a Reliant Robin for some reason. My heart soared.They first appeared in the area

:Wildlife-friendly plantsLeucanthemum vulgare (Ox-eye daisy)Plantago (Plantain)Lychnis flos cuculi (Ragged robin)Dipsacus fullonum (Teasel)Buddleja davidii,'Black Knight' (Butterfly bush)Digitalis grandiflora (Foxglove)Campanula rotundifolia (Harebell)Eupatorium purpureum

to degrade and dilute the wider countryside, urban gardens take on a greater and greater importance in maintaining our biodiversity, be it birds or beetles.Nowadays, Christopher Robin might not even be able find Alexander Beetle in the first place.

, as the four fat balls in one feeder ‘disappeared’ in about three days! I love these feeders that I hang from a branch, and enjoy watching the aeronautical displays of blue tits, starlings and sparrows on the feeders and also the blackbirds, robin, collared

. My favourites include 'Nuit d'ete' (Summer Nights), a spiky cactus variety. We also have 'Chat Noir', which is rather similar, but a little smaller. 'Ragged Robin' has delicate, red petals, and works well when combined with the other two.If you want

in the garden. As with that other garden favourite, the robin, wrens are voracious hunters of insects, and with their inquisitive searching into every available cranny, they will get in there now to clear out the caterpillars, aphids and plant bugs before