wildlife – Peter Donegan Garden Design & Landscaping

Coccinellidae or ladybirds as we know them are members of the beetle family, generally red with black spots head and antennae and can be anything up to almost half an inch in size. But with over 5,000 species they can also be any colour from yellow to black. The less prettier and often referred to a the mealybug Ladybird cryptolaemus montrouzieri should not be confused with the Coccinella septempunctata or what I should refer to as the common ladybird

The ladybird is most famed in horticultural terms for being predators or the boilogical control of the aphid [whitefly or greenfly] and they really are a gardeners friend. That said if you spoke to my niece Lilly… they are most famed to her because she had a pet ladybird once…. but it ‘flew away‘ 😉

Ladybirds and other garden predators are/ can usually be encouraged easily by having areas of undisturbed ground and also by the introduction of attractive flowers.

I spotted this guy above just sitting pretty whilst clipping some crataegus in the garden yesterday…. 😉

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national tree week

Blog posting #300 🙂 March 1st – 7th 2009 is National Tree Week. It’s a cool week. There’s loads of tree events on – literally all over the country. There is no excuse not to get involved. I have some posts on trees, trees, trees and trees here to get you in the groove. That said if you don’t want to plant a tree yourself – you can always sponsor a tree – and it will be planted for you.

The trees don’t have to be huge – they even don’t have to be expensive – but they are important and if we did plant one tree each [that’s over 4 million!!] can you imagine how beautiful the country would look. If where you live is ‘not as green as it should be’, if you want to give something a little not so expensive and don’t want to look like a cheap-skate or if you haven’t seen a bird in your garden since you moved in…. You could… and you really could, make a difference.

Go on plant a tree. And give it a hug after 😆 but of course!