Butterfly & bees

Our gardener duly arrived yesterday. She got down to work, clearing our wild area under the silver birches. She removed half a sack of narcissi bulbs from less than a quarter of the area.

While she did this, I sat on Junior, my stick/stool, chatting & weeding what I could reach from where I sat. Suddenly I noticed further along the path a beautiful butterfly, wings outstretched to the warming sun. It was a peacock butterfly with its large blue-tinged eyes. Unmistakable. It lay there a while before flying off.

For those concerned, we’re not entirely domesticating this area. We do still want to encourage wildlife. We just find dock & rape more appropriate for a field than a garden, especially when such tall plants block up the view to the red astilbe, 3 buddleias, all different colours, azaleas etc. As our gardener’s husband said, it looks so much better now the height has been cut down, even if it hasn’t been totally cleared yet. Now you can see hints of what lies beyond & feel tempted to venture up & explore what lies beyond. Before you saw the jungle & wanted to run in the opposite direction.

At the moment we’re contemplating laying some wild flower seed impregnated lawn. Something which can be mown & yet still flower. Ideally we would place a large bee hotel in the centre as a focal point, something of the size we saw in the Paris botanical gardens. Or maybe we will jut plant wildflowers of our choice …… We’ll see.

 

Bee hotel Parisian style