Monthly Archives: April 2013

Hedgehogs

Keeping your garden safe and welcoming to hedgehogs

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Keeping your garden safe and welcoming to hedgehogs

Safety please always cut the rings off milk bottles, juice bottles, peanut butter/vegemite jars before putting them in the rubbish. Hedgehogs crawl into them, they get stuck on their prickles then they grow into them and have to have them removed surgically. Also empty food tins, yoghurt cartons etc as these can be a hazard to hedgehogs. Because their prickles point backwards, they can get into things but then they can’t get back out.
If you have a fish/lily pond, please put a small pile of rocks in one end so that if a hedgehog falls in it has something to climb out on. They can swim quite well, but not indefinitely. If you have a cattle stop, please put a ramp of some sort in it so any hedgehog that inadvertently falls in can get out.Fishing nets and tennis nets are another great hazard for hedgehogs. These need to be stored well off the ground.

Putting out the welcome mat 
In hot, dry weather, put out a heavy, shallow dish of water if you think you have hedgehogs around. If you want them to stay around consider providing a hedgehog box and put out some cat biscuits for them to eat too. Put out extra feed in March/April at night as this is when hedgehogs are out bulking up on food in preparation and building up condition for their hibernationEncourage a resident hedgehog to your garden as they are a natural garden helper, eating slugs and snails.  Hedgehogs can  die a horrible death from the blue slug bait that is supposed to repel animals.” So please don’t use snail bait, let your hedgehog population do the job, naturally and safely!


Be very careful raking leaves during the winter. if they’ve built up against a wall, fence, compost heap or similar, a hedgehog could be hibernating there or, in the spring, have babies there.
 
Please please… if planning a bonfire, build it up only on the day you intend to light it. Hedgehogs are naturally attracted to want to live and breed in bonfire piles left for weeks and months ahead of the day.
Creative Woodcrafts range of wildlife habitat create  fantastic educational opportunities for schools and pre-schools to learn more about our garden visitors.
This baby hedgehog is cute! it is the African Pygmy hedgehog – not the European one that is found in NZ.
The pic of the baby hedgehog is cute! ,  it is the African Pygmy hedgehog – not the European one that is found in NZ.
Birds

Why should you help birds all year-round – fun and useful visual guide

How to feed and care for garden birds

Lots of people like birds visiting their gardens, but making sure they’re cared for properly can be difficult. Knowing what sort of food to put out and how to best protect feeding areas each season can be confusing.

To help you, we’ve put together a fun and useful visual guide that you can print out and keep.

Why should you help birds all year-round

Bees

Attract and introduce leafcutter bees to your garden

Have you ever noticed holes in your plant leaves and assumed they were the work of a hungry caterpillar? Perfectly rounded  or oval holes on the edges of a leaf are usually the sign of a nearby nesting leafcutter bee.

Photo by Bernhard Plank

Leafcutter bees are one of a huge diversity of native bees that you can easily attract and introduce to your wildlife garden.

These neatly outlined holes on the edge of these leaves are the work of a leafcutter bees. Nectar plants will attract these bees, but to survive from year to year, leafcutter bees need overwintering nest sites, such as those available from www.creativewoodcraft.co.nz.


Unlike butterfly and moth caterpillars, or herbivorous beetles , leafcutter bees don’t eat leaves, but cut off small pieces of leaf to use in building their nests. Leafcutter bees are among a large number of bee species known as “solitary” bees because they don’t live in social hives, like honey and bumble bees. This is important, because bees without a nest to protect are very unlikely to sting you.

Providing habitat

Female leafcutter bees lay their eggs inside hollow plant stems or in existing tunnels in trees and solitary bee nesting houses and use leaf cuttings from nearby plants to build sturdy walls around the eggs to keep them safe and dry in their nest right through the winter. Both males and females visit flowers for nectar to fuel their flight, but females also collect pollen and nectar, which they use to stock their nests with a food supply for the young bees after they hatch. Hatchlings feed on these “pollen balls” til they emerge from the nest the following year.

Providing suitable nesting sites

If your property has brushy areas with lots of old plants, or a few trees with natural cavities, you could well already have resident leafcutter bee populations. But to really increase population survival from year to year (or if you live in more of an urban area where a more manicured look is sometimes required), you can provide nesting sites by hanging a “solitary bee house” which many native bees and other beneficial insects will readily use.

Available from www.creativewoodcraft.co.nz

Beneficial plants.

Leafcutter bees seem to have local preferences for the plants they like to use for nesting. If you see leafcutter holes on your plant leaves, please share with us the species! It’s always interesting to hear about regional preferences, and discover the plants in our backyards that provide the widest range of resources for wildlife…

Leafcutting Bee Cells, to get you started!

Leafcutting Bee Cells containing dormant Leafcutting bees are available at www.creativewoodcraft.co.nz and are shipped between Late April 2013 through to December 14th 2013 while stocks last.

They are offered for sale in sets of x 25
We suggest purchasing two sets to guarantee that you get a good colony going.
Creative Woodcraft Solitary Bee Houses are purposely designed to accept Leafcutting Bee Cells.

Birds

Gardens can offer a real lifeline for wildlife.

We go to great lengths to ensure that special areas in New Zealand are given the right levels of designation and legal protection because of their role in supporting threatened wildlife, but what’s very clear is that every one of our gardens, the places literally on our doorsteps, are important too.”

Gardens can offer a real lifeline for wildlife.  Just doing a few simple things in our gardens can mean they provide food, shelter and nesting spaces for birds, which are most vital for the species that are maybe in decline.  As the cooler months approach, garden birds need all the help they can get as we progress into the breeding seasons, by providing suitable habitat and feeding stations we can make a big difference.

Sparrow

One of our most familiar garden birds. What sparrows really need are gardens full of insects.  Try leaving some areas of grass to grow long.  You can still give it neat edges and make a design feature of it, but crucially this will allow certain insects to thrive and the grasses to set seed. Or why not plant deciduous shrubs where are likely to gather for a good natter, and they love a vegetable patch too.

Starling

In summer starlings seek out insects such as beetles, flies, flying ants and worms, and especially grass grubs, so gardens with a lawn will help.  In autumn they love fruit like elderberries, so try planting an elder tree.  You could also put up a starling nest-box high up on the shady side of a house.

Song thrush

Plant berry-bearing bushes and try to avoid sweeping up all the leaf litter as they’ll hop around in it, flicking over leaves to find food.  They like moist and shady areas, and will really benefit from a garden full of worms and snails, so keep up the mulches in your flower beds, which will help you control weeds too.

Click here to view our selection of hand-crafted bird feeders and habitat.

Birds

Insects and bird nesting boxes

Insects and nestboxes

Bees, wasps or earwigs will, on occasions, take over nestboxes and there is little one can do to prevent it – apart from using insect sprays. As many of the insects are useful food for birds, it is best to leave them alone. Insects often move in after birds have finished nesting. Any young found dead are likely to have died of other natural causes.

It is not unusual for the same type of insect to return to the box in subsequent years. Leave that box in situ and put up another one a few feet away. It is rare for both to be lost to insect invasion.