My Outdoor Studio
My back garden is much like most other suburban gardens in size, about 25 feet long but it is triangular in shape so it is quite small and as we live on the side of a hill, it slopes to the left. We only get diffused sunlight during the day due to the surrounding trees but during early morning and late afternoon we get direct sunlight and during evenings in the summer we often have a lovely golden glow.
When we moved into the house 10 years ago, it was more like a back yard, mostly concrete with a few Leylandii on one side, a rotten, broken and open wooden fence at the bottom and the left side and a straight stone-flagged path which went right down the middle. With a few old and rather spindly trees and bushes including Privet and box hedge it was not very inspiring.
Firstly, we dug up the concrete and grassed a small area, adding shrubs with some year round interest at the back of the garden to give some privacy. We added a wooden cabin for storage and cut a dustbin in half for a small pond when we found a frog living in an old plastic window box under the Leylandii and added a nesting box on the top of the washing line pole which we nicknamed “Rickety Rick” (well, it was a bit!).
Soon, several families of Blue Tits used the nesting box and we also had Thrushes nesting in amongst the Leylandii. The grass was not successful however, mostly due to our beloved, but hopelessly untrainable, Beagle we had at the time using it as a urinal. With a very clay soil and little drainage, it soon started to smell. We also found we had an abundance of snails and slugs who ferociously devoured all of our lovely Hostas we had planted. Time for a rethink.
We dug up the grass, moved the cabin out of the sun to the other side of the garden and took up the flagstones, relaying them as a small patio where the cabin had been. We took down the washing line and replaced it with a rotary dryer which we sited out of the way and cut back or dug up the old spindly trees. We replaced the open fence with panels with wicker trellices on top and planted climbers along the border so they would grow up and fill the panels with greenery, added a couple of new trees and more shrubs, all chosen for their colour, foliage or ability to attract bees or butterflies and things started looking much better.
Where the grass had been, we dug a pond to make a permanent home for our resident frog, with easy exit and entry points and surrounded it with varying sizes of rocks, cobbles and pebbles, planting the area with a variety of flora chosen to provide shade, perches, colour or an ability to attract insects, or for fragrance or year-round interest.
The pond was planted to attract insects and to aeriate the water, with a pile of cobblestones added so any visiting wildlife had a platform on which to rest or take a drink. The Hostas were relocated into pots and positioned near the pond to attract the slugs and so provide a fast food service for the frog, placed on wooden tree trunk slices chosen to attract beetles and other insects. It wasn’t long before our resident frog acquired a family and we counted five different frogs in the pond at one time.
To attract the birds, several feeders were added, hanging them from the branches of the old trees left at the bottom and left hand side of the garden, together with a couple more nesting boxes. We scooped the centre out of an old tree branch and filled it with seed after fixing it to a pole - it looked a bit like a sausage on a stick but when placed in amongst shrubs, you only see the branch so making an ideal stage for some photography.
Within a year, the garden had transformed - our pond had attracted several more frogs and although we have had no spawn to date, I am hopeful. We started seeing dragonflies and many different types of butterflies as the Buddleia really earn their keep. At any given time, we have dozens of birds in the garden either at the feeders or mooching about picking up the seed on the ground. They of course love the snails. The Leylandii is full of various types of spiders and there are beetles and bugs everywhere. On one occasion last summer, a hedgehog visited, taking a swim in the pond and then a sleep in the sun before moving on. We have at least one mouse who spends the winter under the cabin but my husband keeps threatening to evict him as he poos on the cabin floor. (The mouse, not my husband 
)
We added a couple of wooden half barrels, planted with fragrant flowers and used another as a water feature with an upturned wooden bucket on the top and a small pump so that there is constant running water. The birds love this, as they can splash about and wash their feathers more easily than in the pond and they can also drink the running water. This is especially useful in the winter as very often the water in the pond and the barrel will freeze.
Regular bird visitors include bluetits, coat tits, great tits, house sparrows, robins, thrushes, a yellow hammer, goldfinch, wood pigeon, starling, blackbirds, crows and a dove. I also see magpie and house martins around but have never yet seen one in my garden. The house sparrows nested in the hedge at the bottom of the garden this year and we were treated to lots of family outings as the fledglings were brought into the garden to feed and bathe. A wonderful sight. To get close enough to photograph the birds I have hidden in the cabin and in amongst the washing on the rotary dryer but finally, I persuaded my husband that we should replace the back door with a stable door so that I could keep the birds happy with the bottom of the door closed, set up my tripod in the kitchen and wait for them to come to the pond. This was a great idea as the birds don’t feel threatened as long as I keep low or make any sudden movements or noise, so that they now come quite close to where I can use a 200mm lens quite easily.
Although the garden is small, it is always busy. The plants are now all established and attract a huge variety of butterflies and other insects. There is always plenty of material on which to practice techniques or just enjoy taking pictures of the life in my own back garden - my outdoor studio.
Spring 2007 -update
The garden is now busier than ever. We had coal tits nesting in the front garden hedge and bluetits in the side garden. In the back gardem we have had tree sparrows nesting in the Leylandii behind Rickety Rick and house sparrows nesting in the bush at the bottom. It has been great watching each day as the chicks have been learning to junp from branch to branch and sit watching as Mum gets seed from the feeder for them. They are getting quite brave now and are really up to some fun and games.
In the tree at the side of the garden, we have a blackbird nest and although I can’t see in as it is quite high, the female spent weeks picking up twigs and moss from the garden to build an enormous nest. It is quite noisy so I guess there must be a few chicks in there. I watch the male bringing beakfuls of worms, bread and anything else he can find, every 15 minutes into the tree. Any day now the chicks should appear which will be really exciting to watch.
