Wild garden...

As I sit thigh-high in the swaying grass I get to thinking about the joys of gardening for wildlife.

It isn't all it's cracked up to be: in my dreams and schemes I pictured a bucolic scene lifted out of the pages of a Thomas Hardy novel.  Warm summer days. Wildflowers richly peppering the many and various grasses the food source of birds and insects.

Trouble is, the thug swards have elbowed out the flowers.  There are hollyhocks of every hue, sunflowers of skyscraper height, poppies aplenty-ish!  Not nearly enough though.  Mistakenly I thought it was just a matter of Bathsheba-like scattering wildflower seeds; men falling in my wake as I progressed for all the world like a nymph of the meadows... full of fecundity and promise of a roll in the hay.  The reality is a far cry from such idle fancies. It is blooming hard work.  Friends I proudly show my wild garden to, grimace with a wind pain smile as we take tea in the neglected garden.  The nightly visits from the hedgehog lifts the spirits and proves to me I am at least doing something right.