Imagine judging a national garden competition where you get to award points for nettles. Where shaggy areas of long grass are also looked on favourably. And where piles of logs, compost heaps and old seed heads get yippees of approval, writes Jane Powers.
Despite what it might sound like, this contest - of which I was delighted to be a judge - was a serious event: the first Corrin Hill Biodiversity Garden Awards. (Corrin Hill, in case you didn't know, is an all-natural ice cream made by the family-run Silver Pail Dairy, in Fermoy, Co Cork; it runs the competition with BirdWatch Ireland.)
Gardens can provide habitats and food for a panoply of creatures: from the hard-working native earthworm to the exotic birds that stop over for a refuel on their way to Africa. In the Dublin city area alone, gardens make up 25 per cent of the land cover. The way that they are managed can make them congenial spots for our fellow earthlings or hostile and relatively barren places. The greater the range of plants and habitats that one can cram into a garden, or series of gardens, the better it is for everyone.
So, when we were judging, we looked for as much going on as possible in the individual gardens. Shanakill/Rahoonane Community Organic Garden, in Tralee, for instance, which won the community-and-school-garden category, is a hive of biodiversity in the middle of a housing estate. It uses several composting methods to provide natural fertiliser and has lots of productive plots, wildflower and woodland areas, living willow fencing and a wildlife pond.
Our suburban winner, Kay Macklin in Co Monaghan, is keen on native trees, which support enormous amounts of invertebrates and, therefore, supply food for the birds. Her garden is visited and lived in by numerous birds and other flying things, including dragonflies, and has even seen the odd sunbathing lizard.
If there was one feature that we judges were looking for in a garden, it was a pond. All our winners had provided critter-friendly bodies of water, with sloped sides for easy access and with cover for shelter from predators and weather. Our joint overall winners had magnificent ponds. Judy and Joe Barry of Larch Hill Stud, near Kilcock, in Co Kildare, and Janet Whelehan and Michael O'Donnell of Kilanerin, near Gorey, had perfect, watery wildlife sanctuaries.
The latter garden is a mere three years old, but its animal tally is impressive: 45 bird species, 440 different moths, 16 butterflies, 13 dragonflies and a crowd of four-footed beasties. When the couple moved into the newly-built house with its acre of garden, they were careful to preserve the scrubby woodland that had grown up at the rear. In the front they planted shelter belts of willow, as well as hazel and dogwood; new, mainly native hedging makes up the side boundaries. Boggy areas, drainage ditches and two ponds offer further habitats; near the house, nectar-rich perennials (verbena, sedum, rudbeckia, helenium and many herbs) and ornamental grasses with seed heads provide food for bees, butterflies, hoverflies and birds. The garden is as pretty as a picture - and exceptionally welcoming to non-humans. "We aim for an amount of wildness," says Whelehan, "but not too much." She and O'Donnell grow food as well, and they don't mind if birds eat their raspberries or strawberries - which is mighty big of them.
Judy and Joe Barry's garden in Co Kildare is more established: they built the house 11 years ago, but they already owned the surrounding farmland. Joe, who is a forester (and chairman of Crann), planted a mixed woodland around the perimeter a dozen years ago, with an edging of hazel and holly for biodiversity. Its rapid growth is proof that you don't have to wait generations to create a wood. Near the house is a country garden, with perennials, shrubs, roses and climbers. One part of the house is cloaked with the evergreen, South American Cissus striata, whose glossy black berries feed blackbirds and thrushes. Joe's sister, an ornithologist, has counted 71 bird species, including barn and long-eared owls.
As with all the other winning gardeners, the Barrys take a benign approach. "The most important things are what we don't do," says Joe. "We don't spray for weeds, or use pesticides, or strim madly." "We leave some areas semi-wild," adds Judy. "We leave seed heads on and let things seed around, and we don't use artificial fertilisers. We grow as many kinds of plants as possible, to provide food at all times of the year."
The Barrys provide bat and bird boxes, and they also have a "wildlife hotel", a structure made from used pallets, stuffed with logs, bricks and plant pots, where insects can set up house. They admit that their habitat-rich plot probably has plenty of natural insect-roosting places, so the "hotel" is a bit of a luxury. But it is this approach - the urge to do the extra bit for our fellow earth-dwellers - that makes this, and all the other winners, wildlife champions.
For more, see www.corrinhill.ie/biodiversitygardens, www.birdwatchireland.ie, www.biology.ie, www.irishwildflowers.ie and www.dublin.ie/ environment/biodiversity/home.htm
Corrin Hill Biodiversity Garden Awards
OVERALLJanet Whelehan and Michael O'Donnell, Kilanerin, Gorey, Co Wexford, jointly with Judy and Joe Barry, Larch Hill Stud, Kilcock, Co Kildare
RURAL GARDENSAs above
COMMUNITY AND SCHOOL GARDENSShanakill/Rahoonane Community Organic Garden, Shanakill, Tralee, Co Kerry
SUBURBAN GARDENSKay Macklin, Tinkeenan, Co Monaghan
SPECIAL COMMENDATIONS RURAL:Carla Blake, Conna, Co Cork; Naomi Coad-Maenpaa, Kilmacthomas, Co Waterford; Jill Crosher, Tralee, Co Kerry; Denis Daly and Wendy Stringer, Westport, Co Mayo; Kay Synnott, Rosscahill, Co Galway.
COMMUNITY AND SCHOOL GARDENS:Scoil Bhríde, Shantalla, Galway
SUBURBAN:Mary Fitzgerald, Terenure, Dublin 6; Jacinta Egan, Blackrock, Co Dublin; Harry Brown, Lismore, Co Waterford; Heather Quinn, Howth, Co Dublin; Philip and Freda Gormley, Magherafelt, Co Derry; Peter Fleming, Douglas, Co Cork