Speaker 1: Welcome to Gardening with Ben. You'll go to podcast for
all things green and growing in twenty twenty five. Whether
you're a seasoned gardener, a budding enthusiast, or just curious
about cultivating your own slice of nature, you're in the
right place. Join me Ben as we explore practical tips,
inspiring stories, and the latest trends in gardening to make
your outdoor space bloom with life, from allotment adventures to
wildlife friendly gardening. I'm here to help you grow your
passion and read the rewards. So grab your gloves, roll
up your sleeves, and let's get started on this year's
gardening journey. Hey everyone, and welcome back to Gardening with
Ben for another brand new podcast. It's Friday Fridays here.
The weekend is finally upon us pretty soon. So what
is happening this weekend? It is the Big Bird Watch. Yes,
we will be watching the birds, the feathered variety of birds,
and we will be counting them to see how many
different varieties see or how many birds come down at once.
And it's quite hard, obviously, you will say that it's
best to capture within an hour how many birds you
see at one time. And because obviously you'll see a
blueted come have some seed and then it'll fly off again.
But it's how many birds you see in one go
is how it counts. I believe I need to read
up on that. But what can we do for the
birds in our garden? How can we encourage the birds
to come down? And what is the purpose of bothering
to feed the birds in our garden? Obviously I love
seeing the birds at my atment. I was down at
the allotment the last weekend and all I could hear
was the birds singing. It was absolutely beautiful. And obviously
there's not many birds around at the moment because some
are migrated, etc. Some are hibernated, and yeah, you don't
see as many birds around at this time of year,
but the birds that you do see are absolutely gorgeous.
And we had the robin come down in my shed
at the weekend and it just sat there and I
managed to get a fantastic photo. If you've not seen
that photo, check it out. It's on my Instagram and
on my Facebook. And my goal this weekend is going
to be to try and get a robin to come
and land in my hand and take a photo of it.
That is what I want to try and do. That
would make an absolutely fantastic photo. But robbins are really
really tame, So hopefully we will get that robin to
land in this hand and get that photo. And obviously
different birds like different seed or varieties out there. Obviously
you've got your fat balls, which robin's like your blut.
It's like you've got your meal worms, which robins again,
like you've got your sunflower seeds, and you've got your
peanuts as well. There's many different varieties out there. You
can also help the birds, the blackbirds that are and
get some Sultan amazons. They absolutely love them. So I
purchased some Sultan amazons this weekend to put out for
them because I love seeing the blackbirds as well. The
blackbirds make up lovely singing sound while you're down there.
We used to have some blackbirds in our old house
garden and you used to walk down garden and they
used to like fly at you because they've got some
babies in a nest nearby. They're really really protective of
the babies, the black But why should we encourage birds
to our garden? Well, the reason why we need to
encourage the births of the garden is because they are
natural predators. They will come and they will eat the
slugs in your garden. So if you've got lots of
birds coming down in your garden, the chances are they'll
fly into one of your vegetables and get the slugs
the insects out of your vegetables and out of your flowers.
So obviously attracting the birds to your garden is another thing,
but there is downsides. Obviously, they can attract rats, they
can attract mice, they can attract squirrels to your garden.
I don't mind squirrels in my garden. I absolutely love
seeing the squirrels. Yes, they can be a pain, they
can pull stuff up, they can eat some stuff, and
they can eat all your seed in your seed feeders
and all the peanuts. But I don't mind seeing the
squirrels down in my garden. And obviously we've got a
cat on our allotment site, so if there's rats and
mice around, the cat will catch them. So everything works
in its own way. Obviously, if you've got it in
your garden, you're not You don't necessarily want that some
mice in your garden. Do you. But I don't mind
on my allotment as long as nothing's harming me. I'm
all for the wildlife in the garden and I'm going
to try and do more to encourage the wildlife in
our garden. And one of the things what I did
last weekend is I must have spent about thirty pounds
on bird stuff. This is my hobby. At the end
of the day, I'd rather spend money on my allotment
than waste it away on rubbish. So we've been obviously
getting with purchased some peanuts, We purchased some bird seed,
with purchased some sunflower seed. With purchased five new bird feeders,
yes five, so I've got I'll have about nine up
in total, so hopefully we'll be getting the birds flocking
to our allotment and enjoying them. We've bought some sewet balls.
We've bought some sewet blocks to put in our set
block holders, because we've got some new ones of those
this year, so we need to fill them up. We've
also got some raisins and sultanas because we want to
feed the blackbirds down at the allotment. I want to
see more blackbirds down at my a lotment, and obviously
the different types of birds se can attract different birds,
so I'm hoping to start attracting the green finchers and
chaffinches as obviously I always see the bluet's and the
robbins down there, but I don't often see them chaffinches
or green finchers down there. So hopefully we'll get lots
more varieties of birds coming and hopefully helping them and
looking after them, because that's what we want to do.
We want to attract the birds down to our allotment.
I absolutely love it. We've got up three bird houses now,
We've got two up for bluets, we've got one up
for sparrows as well, and I'm looking at investing in
getting some robbing houses as well. So obviously they're nesting
nearby because we've got lots of robbins down on our plot,
so they're obviously nesting somewhere. But what I want to
do is try and attract more, more and more birds
to my garden. And I'm even looking at getting an
owl house because my allotment is like not too far
away from like woods and stuff, and it's pretty an
open site. So if I could attract an owl to
our site, that would be absolutely fantastic. So if anybody's
got any owl houses, let me know. I've heard a
look online. I've researched them, and I just fancy having
an owl on my plot because I've got my wildlife
cameras up and everything now, so to see an owl
on one of my wildlife cameras here be phenomenal. But
we can we can try different things. There's plenty of
different houses out there for different birds to come and
visit the plot. I just want to do my little
bit and encourage the wildlife. And like I said, I've
not got a garden. My allotment is my garden, so
I don't mind investing in putting money into my plot
and enjoying the rewards as it is the thing that
helps me with my mental health. So I hope that
you're all going to get involved in the Big bird
watch this weekend, even if it's just buying one bird feeder,
as if you're wanting to get involved, like I went
to Morrison's and their bird feeder were five pound and
it comes filled with seed, So you can just go
out and get one of those and stick it up
and if you're wanting to get involved with on Saturday
and Sunday, put it out on Friday and a few
days before the Big Bird Watch, and then the birds
will be able to find it and see it, and
then you'll be able to get involved in the Big
Bird Watch at the weekend. And let me know how
you get on. Let me know what birds you see
in your garden. I'd love to hear what you get.
And hopefully we get some good footage down at the
allotment tomorrow because that's what we want, some decent footage
and some great photos. So until next time, everyone, remember,
keep smiling, keep shining, and keep gardening with everyone. Thanks
for tuning in to today's episode of Gardening with Ben.
I hope you've enjoyed our chat and picked up some
tips to help your garden and allotment pride. Don't forget
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next time, everyone, remember, keep smiling, keep shining, and keep
gardening with Ben