Painting in the Wild-life Garden

Yesterday I went to The Scottish Gallery and looked at their Flora Depicta exhibition (here's the link: http://www.scottish-gallery.co.uk/exhibitions/page/flora_depicta ). This inspired me to try and do some flower painting myself. I wanted to try and capture something of our wild-life garden.

I chose a spot which is a glorious tangle of vegetation. I know my limitations; no chance of precise botanical drawing. But I did want to capture the atmosphere of the spot, and have something which will remind me of it. I chose to try acrylic on "not pressed" watercolour paper. This was the set-up.

The first step was to put on some loose washes of pure red, blue and yellow. These constituted the beginnings of a composition, and they would be a background to all the detail that was to come. You will notice that green was not used. I knew there would be an overwhelming amount of green to come, so I wanted different colours in the background.

Then I took a little bottle of black acrylic ink and did some rough sketching. I was not aiming for precise lines, so I used a twig not a pen. The point was to give myself a composition and some shapes to work with indicating where the main plant stems would be. The twig was just picked up on the spot. It won't worry me at all if some of the marks are visible in the final painting.

The next step was to paint in some dark. There's a wall covered in ivy in the background and soil in the foreground, all heavily shaded.

In retrospect I think I could have put in more dark blue and brown at this stage, but more could be added later.

Now for the hard work,painting a myriad leaves in many different greens. On my palette I put Cadmium Yellow Light, Lemon Yellow, Ultramarine Blue and Cerulean Blue. These gave a lot of different combinations.

Painting the mass of leaves took about an hour. I did not try and draw the outline of individual leaves, but I did look closely at the size of marks and at the amount of yellow or of blue in the greens. I also put.in more shade.  

And finally what I had had in mind from the start. I took a smaller brush and used mixtures of pure red and white for the foxglove flowers. I tried to observe them closely. The same went for the meadowsweet; I found the subtle off-white of these flowers, the frothy look, and the variations of light and shade almost impossibly difficult.

I tidied up a few details here and there, but the fact that I was too tired after two intense hours to do much more at least prevented me making it worse by overworking.

30 Days Wild in the garden

June was the month of “30 Days Wild”. It would have been lovely to get out and about more. I did manage a few walks by our local canal. There was one superb day in the southern Highlands, going up Stob Binnein with a group of friends. The spectacular day amongst the wild flowers and birds at Aberlady coincided with the battery on my camera running out, so there are no pictures. But I was thrilled to see a dabchick (Little Grebe) and lots of twayblades – a big green orchid.

But mainly the 30 Days Wild scheme was an incentive to observe my wild-life garden a bit more closely every day and chart the numerous developments over the summer. 

The spring blossoms – rowan and hawthorn – were pretty well over. But there were frothy white elderflowers, even though I cut the bushes back pretty heavily in the winter. Just in time, before June ended, the sweet briar that tangles all over the garage, bloomed. It has ferocious spines and beautiful pink flowers.

On the very last day before the scheme ended an orchid came into flower in the patch of uncut grass that I call the meadow. It is cut like a traditional hay-field, in late summer. Then in autumn it is raked and re-cut and trampled, which perhaps creates the effect of cattle grazing. For a really fine meadow one ought to clear the ground and re-seed it with a special mixture. We've just left it as a former lawn – and so far this year we've had buttercups, cuckoo-flowers, speedwell – and this orchid. The long grass can be pretty too, and it is ideal cover for frogs.

I do think it is a mistake only to value wild nature when it is pretty, or expensive, or sublime. Blackfly are irritating to gardeners, but they are as remarkable as any other phenomenon. As for nettles, they can be invasive, and I spend a lot of time pulling them out where they are not wanted – but are the flowers not complex and delicate. On the bird-feeders I'm pleased to see blue-tits and sparrows. But my 30 Days Wild photo happened to be a goldfinch. They are no less wonderful because more common than they used to be. The garden does seem good for pollinators, though I lack the expertise or the patience to tell one bumblebee from another.

The most exciting bit of wild nature this June was, as usual, the pond. It has become terribly overgrown; but that is good for some things. It is now bright with spearwort and the yellow flag irises are blazing. Pond-skaters are the most conspicuous insect; they seem to defy all predators. As for the predators, I know there are plenty of palmate newts around, though they are shy. Easier to spot are the frogs, and it was such a pleasure last week to spot a baby looking for cover.

This house and garden is too big for an elderly retired couple, so we are soon, I expect, to move out. The new owners will, of course, manage it how they want. I hope that they will enjoy the wild life too.

My Wild-life Garden Chapter 33: May 22

This blog about one year in the wild-life garden is nearing its end. If there are any new things to tell you in the next year I will add them in. Last summer, for example, was a bad one for butterflies. Let us hope to see more this summer. Our most conspicuous wild-life just now, on days that wet the grass, is garden snails (Helix apsera). They are inclined to eat new plants I buy – delphiniums disappeared overnight – but they are very magnificent. Most of the other plant eaters are kept in check by predators – black beetles, lady-birds, wasps, frogs and so on. But snails are well protected. On the rare occasions I have seen a thrush (for thrushes do know how to crack snail-shells) the blackbirds have swiftly driven it off.

Garden Snail

The Rowan blossom (Sorbus aucuparia) is coming out and there should be fine berries in August. 

Rowan

The managed wild-flower bed is full of different leaf-shapes, so we should start to have flowers for pollinators and for colour soon. The first buttercups are coming into flower, with a promise of plenty more any day. Plenty of Creeping buttercups (Ranunculus repens) and I spend a lot of time weeding them out. But many years ago I bought a packet of Meadow buttercups (Ranunculus acris), and they have repaid the investment a thousand-fold. They move around, and do not always grow where I expected; but they are one of the highlights of early summer.

Meadow Buttercup

In the hedge the plant I grew from a seed picked out of a sunken lane twenty-five years ago has started to grow strongly. It is a Guelder-rose (Viburnum opulus), and will have flowers in due course.

Guelder-rose

I do not want you to think I am more fond of dandelions than of anything else, but I must add a picture of the well-known clock. What a magnificent structure. My case rests.

Dandelion clock

In case this is my last chapter in this blog let me end by summing up my rules for wild-life gardening:

• Never use pesticides.
• Make a pond, however small.
• Many so-called weeds are beautiful wild-flowers, much loved by pollinators.
• If possible have a native tree – even if it is coppiced or reduced to a hedge-size.
• Don't tidy up too much. Dead leaves and stems, seed heads and sticks are all used as habitats.
• Have places that are deliberately suitable for wild creatures to live in – piles of sticks, bird boxes, cracks in stone walls,insect houses and so on.
• Try leaving a patch of grass that you only cut once a year, like hay. I've been rewarded with cowslips, buttercups, orchids, cuckoo-flower – as well as interesting grasses.
• Put up bird-feeders and maintain them.

That'll do for a start.

My Wild-life Garden Chapter 32: May 13th

I know it is only four days since the last chapter, but they have been four days of sun, and some beautiful flowers have appeared. The old rhyme about April flowers bringing forth May flowers seems to have worked here. They will all be fairly prolific as the summer progresses and I suppose they might be called weeds in some contexts.

The Welsh Poppy (Meconopsis cambrica) is the largest of them, a paler yellow than dandelions, and with a form and confidence that would befit a cultivated plant. But these just turn up, particularly where there is a wall or a crack in paving.

Welsh Poppy

The Herb Robert (Geranium robertianum) seeds so readily that I pull a lot out. But plenty remains. I love the pink flowers, with darker veins, and the typical Cranesbill seed-pods. I brought my original plant back from the Lake District.

Herb Robert

The meadow area is increasingly being colonised by speedwell. I guess these are Common Field Speedwell (Veronica persica), described in my flower book as “an alien weed of cultivation, first recorded 1825”. Ah well. It looks nice.

Speedwell

Also in the meadow a Cuckooflower (Cardamine pratensis) has come up. It likes damp places and I have seen it flourishing over several square yards in other spots. Here it hangs on. It is also known as Ladies Smock.

Cuckooflower

When the garden was first set up my father-in-law brought a small plant of Lords and Ladies (Arum maculatum) from the old ditch that bordered his garden. I stuck it behind the hedge, and it has grown and grown. Look at it now. In late summer every spike will be a wand of scarlet berries.

Lords and Ladies

Followers of this blog will already know about the success of our little bee-house. Well, yesterday I saw not just the mud-plugged holes, but an adult Mason Bee. It is some sort of Osmia, but my insect book says “there are many similar species”.

Mason Bee

This blog is nearing its end; one year was the idea. I would love to think that you were encouraged to try wild-life gardening too. We have been lucky to have so much ground. I think it is fair to call it “medium sized”. Here is a map that I made when the garden was the site of a U3A visit.

The Wild-life Garden

My Wild-life Garden Chapter 31: May 9th

Since the last chapter I have had an intense burst of exam marking, with no time to go into the garden. Now I get back to it and find it is nearly summer, never mind spring. The beech (Fagus sylvatica) in the hedge is coming into leaf at last, and so is the oak (Quercus robur). 

Beech buds opening

New leaves are particularly lovely. We have one or two big clumps of fern where they have just turned up. Now the fronds are uncurling.

Fern uncurling

There is a cowslip (Primula veris) in the meadow, and a carpet of bluebells. 

Cowslip

These are, I must admit, not the native British species but the vigorous Spanish bluebells (Hyacinthoides hispanica). There were already one or two in the garden before we arrived and they have spread and spread. If anyone doubts that dandelions brighten up any patch of grass, look at this.

Dandelions

Today it was hot enough to sit out and read a book. An orange tip butterfly (Anthocharis cardamines) passed through. It must have woken from hibernation. There were plenty of gnats and hoverflies, and various bumblebees. Best of all, a sudden shrieking told me that the swifts (Apus apus) are back. About seven rushed back and forth, shouting shrilly and loud. I would have said this was a little earlier than in most years. It is so good to see them, all the way from Southern Africa.

And today I saw my first two-spot ladybird (Adalia bipunctata) of the year. Quite apart from looking nice, they play a big part in keeping the aphid population under control.

Ladybird

So do the frogs. Breeding is over, but there are plenty of damp, shady places in the garden for them to lurk in. 

Common frog

My Wild-life Garden Chapter 30: April 30th

Those of you who live in the UK will know that we have had a week of cold weather, with some snow settling in places. But spring has kept going in the garden, and the growing plants have welcomed the rain water. I do like going out to look at the budding leaves in the hedge. This very special moment of spring only lasts a few days, so please do not miss it. Any deciduous trees will do for showing this natural glory.

Silver Birch

Birch catkins

Hazel

Hawthorn

The most exciting thing in the garden this week has no photo to illustrate it. The other morning I was up a bit earlier than usual and saw a very large fox disappear into the thicket by the veg patch. There is space behind the shrubs and ivy, and a suggestive hole between the leaves, so it may be living quietly in there. I am not going to go poking about and disturb it – or risk being bitten, I suppose. If I see it again I will post updates. Urban foxes can be a pest, but this was a magnificent creature.

We hardly ever see bullfinches in this garden – about three times in 30 years, I guess. So it was a thrill to see some the other day, and even to get a photo.

Bullfinch

They (three of them) were not at a bird-feeder but browsing on clematis buds.

Just now – as I write – a see a house sparrow collecting feathers. Nest-building is such hard work.

My Wild-life Garden year Chapter 29: April 22nd

Suddenly it has been so warm and sunny that the garden is changing by the day. As one of my favourite poems on spring begins:

“Nothing is so beautiful as spring,
When weeds in wheels shoot long and lovely and lush” (Gerard Manley Hopkins)

There certainly is no shortage of lush growth – weeds if you insist. As a matter of fact I do not let everything grow at random. I have already weeded out a lot of Great Willowherb (Epilobium hirsutum) and tried to remove grass from the managed wildflower bed. The willowherb is known as fireweed, because shoots from its underground runners are often the first thing to reappear on burnt ground. A big clump in a country lane can look magnificent. In a garden they will take over if allowed. I can't resist letting one or two flower in late summer, but I pay for it the following spring.

Water-lily leaves

In the pond the tadpoles are growing and multiplying. Also in the pond are lovely unfurling leaves of White Waterlily (Nymphaea alba). I bought one small plant about twenty years ago. Now it threatens to take the pond over.



On Wednesday night the conditions were perfect for going out after dark with a torch. I ought to do it more often. This time I saw the two things I hoped for. In the pond was a newt – I'm fairly sure the ones in our garden are Palmate Newts (Triturus helveticus). On the compost heap were some magnificent Great Grey Slugs (Limax maximus). You may well have some in your garden and not know it, for they only come out at night. They eat decaying vegetable matter, so they do no harm to your plants.

I have now seen a Queen Wasp (Vespula vulgaris). I assume it was a Common, but they can only be distinguished from other common wasps by studying their facial features, which I was not in a position to do. If she tries to build a nest on a window frame, or where the children play, I shall knock it off; but if it is up a tree or a roof that's fine. They are wonderful creatures and the chances of getting stung, unless you provoke them, are not great. One year there was a nest in the compost heap. That was a nuisance.

Green alkanet (Pentaglottis sempervirens) has to be rooted out almost everywhere in the garden, it is so tough and prolific. But it does have lovely blue flowers in the right places, and is welcomed by pollinators.

More tadpoles

Green Alkanet and Bumble bee

Lesser celandines (Ranunculus ficaria) can also be a pest if they get established in a border. But if you have a wild area at the base of a hedge, what better in
spring.

Lesser Celandines

Ivy Berries

I've removed wheelie-bin loads of ivy (Hedera helix) over the winter, but there is still plenty around. It fruits at a different time of year from most berries, and provides welcome food for blackbirds and woodpigeons.

My Wild-life Garden Chapter 28: April 19th

What a difference one warm sunny day makes! Today I sat in the garden for lunch and saw, in the space of two minutes: a swarm of gnats dancing (please do not ask me what variety); a big hover-fly hovering (once again precise identification is beyond me); and three peacock butterflies - two in a mating dance and one single. These butterflies (Inachis io) hibernate over the winter and emerge to breed once the spring warms up. All those crevices in walls and gaps between the planks of a shed are serving a purpose. Lots of insects use them.

In my last entry, Chapter 27, I put "Ash" as the caption for a photo of a Sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus) bud. I have now made a correction. I wonder if there were no comments because nobody noticed or because you all thought "Stupid old fool. Nice photos anyhow". Ash (Fraxinus excelsior) is usually fairly late in bursting into leaf.

One bizarre appearance this year has been a chestnut seedling.

Was it a grandchild or a squirrel that brought the conker here?

In the pond there has been a good hatch of tadpoles. The fact that next door is a bit of a building site has its advantages. I fancy it keeps some large predators away. The exception is many cats from the neighbourhood. I do not understand why they are permitted to hunt my wild birds, trample on my seed-beds and dig up my new plants. If they were dogs I could prosecute the owners. But the tadpoles, at least, are safe.

New tadpoles

Another sign of spring in this street is that gulls look for nest-sites on the roof. Later on they even swoop down on passers-by, let alone roofers mending gutters. A few years ago the odd numbers hired a falconer to roam the roof-tree and scare them off. We even-numbered houses, who rather like birds, had a free show. I'm not sure it has made much difference.

The gulls have arrived

Lots of plants are growing, of course. Do not expect photos till they flower, and do not expect anything too dramatic.

Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)

When you find yourself thinking "Look at my beautiful dandelions," you may call yourself a real wild gardener.

My Wild-life Garden Chapter 27: April 11

After a week away in the Lake District we returned to find spring edging cautiously into the wild garden. Some frog-spawn has hatched into tadpoles; some remain blobs of jelly. Rampant wild plants such as alkanet (Pentaglottis sempervirens), nettles (Urtica dioica), couch grass (Eletrygia repens), great willow-herb (Epilobium hirsutum) and meadow sweet (Filipendula ulmaria) are showing themselves. I have to decide where I want them and where they must be restrained. A beautiful snakes-head fritillary (Fritillaria meleagris) that I had completely forgotten about has popped up and burst into flower. I must have bought the bulb on impulse last year and buried it more in hope than expectation. I see in my flower-book that it is a south-of-England plant, so perhaps I have anticipated global warming by encouraging them in Edinburgh.

Fritillary

There are pond-skaters on the pond.  (Family Gerridae. There are many varieties)

Various small birds are undoubtedly nesting, but I have not yet made a positive identification of any specific nests. I have not learned how to do this without disturbing the birds. I have had some fun with the zoom on my camera at the bird-feeders. One of the things I have more and more felt as I get older is the fascination and pleasure in the ordinary. Of course it is nice to see a waxwing, but the blue tits are wonderful wild-life too.

Goldfinches

Grey Squirrel

Sparrow

Grey Squirrels arouse a mixture of emotions, I know. If I lived in a place where red squirrels were threatened, I would encourage the reds and discourage the greys. Here the greys are part of the life.

I have mentioned before that the variety of buds in the hedge are always interesting. Here are some photos of them today.

Sycamore

Hawthorn

Hazel (The Beech on the right thinks it is still winter)

Things happen fast in spring once the weather warms up. I hope to have several more chapters soon.