Nature Friendly Garden

spadoosh

Hate to be a party pooper particularly with pretty plants and wildlife but please try and avoid using buddleia in the UK... Its invasivs and spreads very easily. Theres a building a few doors down from me that looks like this...

Gers

https://www.justbeedrinks.co.uk/seeds/

There are also free seeds available from https://www.growwilduk.com/form/grow-wildflowers-us-spring though it's too late for the 2019 offer.

My borage was brilliant last year as was Inula hookeri https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2016/oct/01/plant-of-the-week-inula-hookeri I tracked down some of these plants via help on this forum. The bees and butterflies were carpeting the flowers. It's now beginning to come back to life again.

MFW_DannyG

Thanks everybody for your replies, I'm going to make a list and go shopping at the weekend!

Davesnave

spadoosh wrote: »

Hate to be a party pooper particularly with pretty plants and wildlife but please try and avoid using buddleia in the UK... Its invasivs and spreads very easily. Theres a building a few doors down from me that looks like this...

To be brutally honest, whether people do or don't grow buddleia won't make a scrap of difference. It's endemic to industrial and building sites, waste ground, railway embankments etc etc and the seeds travel far and wide. It's here to stay, possibly longer than us.

If a building looks like that, it's down to neglectful humans.

And hey, the insects need all the help they can get right now!

[Deleted User]

Re: Buddleja ……


There are new cultivars now.


One type grows to just over a metre high.
Another to under a metre.


The characteristics are identical just in miniature.
Great for containing or planting out and add masses of colour to any spot now.


I've always gardened with wildlife in mind and Buddleja is a plant that's always in my gardens en-masse


Agree about the Agastache too

spadoosh

Davesnave wrote: »

To be brutally honest, whether people do or don't grow buddleia won't make a scrap of difference. It's endemic to industrial and building sites, waste ground, railway embankments etc etc and the seeds travel far and wide. It's here to stay, possibly longer than us.

If a building looks like that, it's down to neglectful humans.

And hey, the insects need all the help they can get right now!

Native alternatives can offer enough help for insects.

I suspect it is here to stay, i dont think we should be encouraging it though, its just an unnecessary expense. The more people plant in their gardens, the more seed their is to spread.

spadoosh

Catsacor wrote: »

Re: Buddleja ……


There are new cultivars now.


One type grows to just over a metre high.
Another to under a metre.


The characteristics are identical just in miniature.
Great for containing or planting out and add masses of colour to any spot now.


I've always gardened with wildlife in mind and Buddleja is a plant that's always in my gardens en-masse


Agree about the Agastache too

Wouldnt they just pollinate larger varieties?

My concern isnt you trashing your own home, its the contributing to damage caused elsewhere. Which costs us all money. For bees and butterflies. When there are perfectly suitable (for wildlife) and native and less damaging alternatives.


I just dont see much sense in planting something i know will cost me money in damage later on.

andrewf75

spadoosh wrote: »

Hate to be a party pooper particularly with pretty plants and wildlife but please try and avoid using buddleia in the UK... Its invasivs and spreads very easily. Theres a building a few doors down from me that looks like this...

Looks good to me.

I like to see plants growing wherever they can in our concrete jungles.

I do take your point about buddleja though, but we're not going to stop it now...

spadoosh

andrewf75 wrote: »

Looks good to me.

I like to see plants growing wherever they can in our concrete jungles.

I do take your point about buddleja though, but we're not going to stop it now...

I quite like far eastern concrete jungles for that.

Ive got a feeling if i said the same about climate change (were not going to stop it now or even the decline of insect populations), it wouldnt go down well.

andrewf75

spadoosh wrote: »

I quite like far eastern concrete jungles for that.

Ive got a feeling if i said the same about climate change (were not going to stop it now or even the decline of insect populations), it wouldnt go down well.

Fair point!