While some of the country basks in baking sunshine, the South Shropshire Hills are warm and sunny, but with the ever present cooling breeze from the west – just perfect. Perfect weather for butterflies too and although the actual numbers are not good after such a poor start to the summer weather, there are eight species in the garden at the moment. A wildflower meadow not only looks great at this time of year, it also attracts a range of butterflies that are not abundant in other habitats, so it’s good to have meadow browns and ringlets around. They both like to visit ox-eye daisies and knapweed which I have planted in abundance, as do the small tortoiseshells. New brood holly blues, commas and small tortoiseshells are also feeding around the garden but sadly there is no sign at the moment of the white letter hairstreak that we sometimes see.
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About wildlifegardening
Jenny Steel was a Plant Ecologist at Oxford University before becoming a writer. She has more than 20 years experience of writing about and teaching ecology, natural history and wildlife gardening. She is also a photographer, journalist and former plant nursery owner, and a lecturer and tutor in adult education. She has appeared on a variety of radio and television programmes including Gardener’s World with Alan Titchmarsh, and she presented a series of items on the BBC 2 gardening show, How Does Your Garden Grow. She has worked with and written for a variety of organisations including the Royal Horticultural Society, Natural England, Atropos, Ernest Charles, the Adult Residential Colleges Association (ARCA), Haiths, Usborne Books, Complete Gardens, Oxfordshire County Council, the charity Growing Native and several of the Wildlife Trusts. She is also the Garden Bird Guru for the wild bird food company JustAddBirds of which she was a co-founder. The Emmy Award winning film company Panache Productions are currently making a film about her wildlife garden in South Shropshire. She has written 10 books on wildlife gardening. Her website can be found at www.wildlife-gardening.co.uk and her bird food company at www.JustAddBirds.co.uk
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