On a sunny Sunday in late May, 15 of us gathered at Chamber’s Farm Wood butterfly garden, to work with Audrey who is overseeing the revamp of this lovely garden.
Volunteers maintain the garden, which is right by the visitor centre. It takes a lot of work which meant it became rather neglected. Our Group has held workdays at Chamber’s Farm Wood for several years, working with the Butterfly Conservation Group, so we were delighted to be able to help out with the butterfly garden.
Audrey gave us a carefully drawn plan. The main project was to put board
edging round a large planting bed, to cover it with a membrane which would
stop the weeds getting through but would allow rain to get to plants and
then to plant buddleias and hebes and cover the membrane with bark
chippings. A supplementary project was to create a wire mesh ‘bin’ for
winter leaves, where they would break down into leaf mould
Soon teams of people were busy at work on the planting bed – treating the timber boards for the bed edges, digging out the edges ready for the boards, covering the overgrown bed with membrane, etc. Luckily it was a calm day so large expanses of membrane were easily controlled!
At the same time, a happily noisy group put in the stakes to mark out the leaf mould bin and then fixed wire mesh around them.
After a welcome lunch break we completed the task – planting lots of
buddleias and some hebes which when they flower will provide lots of nectar
for butterflies and other insects – and then spreading out the bark
chippings. While we waited for a delivery of chippings, several members of
the group were able to take a walk to the meadows to see the rare Marsh
Fritillary (Euphydryas aurinia) butterfly. Apparently it is now confined to
the south and west of the UK although there are local records from about 40
to 50 years ago. It was released locally by persons unknown in 1992 and has
survived since.
A good day, and another valuable project completed for the benefit of wildlife – and human visitors to the garden and wood. And we have had reports since the workday that visitors feel the garden has been much improved by our work.
Jude
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