My garden is teetering on the edge of summer as it inevitably gives way to the beginning of autumn and the seasons blend, ebb and flow in a gently changing palette.
The purple loosestrife towers shocking pink above the pond and wild carrot’s delicate white lace still decorates the meadow lawn but the first colouring leaves are noticeable now, there are apples ripening and as the wild rose hips redden and shine the elder berries drip deep and inky purple from the hedge.
After their post nesting rest to moult and recuperate, the birds are back again and they and we seem to have the best of both seasons. Edges are our garden’s greatest assets, as well as the seasonal ones, those physical edges defining spaces are so important that ecologists give them a specific title, ecotones.
Where habitats come together and overlap their biodiversity increases, ecotones are to be found in even the smallest places, along a sheltering hedgerow, beneath a shady tree canopy and in the slightly damper dips and hollows or compacted patches of a meadow lawn. Along the margins and shallows of a pond as dry land transitions to deeper water and where a gravel path peters out into planting and the opportunities of sharp drainage meet those of more fertile soil, plant species change, variety and biodiversity increases.
We often think that our gardens are too small to accommodate the range of habitats which develop and thrive in the vast rewilded areas we read about, but we mustn’t forget that our own garden is not alone. There is also next door, next door but one, the rest of the street, village, town and onward over miles and miles of gardens.
As the crow flies and looks down, he doesn’t see our own individual patch, he sees a wide and ever changing landscape with opportunities to find shelter and food, big trees to set up home in and the landscape’s edges formed, not just from our built and planted boundaries, but the changes in habitat where diversity is greatest. Even the edges of busy roads where they meet the kerb and collect the occasional unfortunate roadkill victim, he’s not called the carrion crow for nothing!
