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How to Attract Wildlife to Your Garden & Allotment | Easy Nature-Friendly Tips
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Nov 13, 2024
🌿 Start Thinking About Attracting Wildlife to the Garden and Allotment! It’s not just about what we grow — it’s about who we share it with! 🦔🦋 In today’s episode, I chat about how to make your garden or allotment more wildlife-friendly. From planting pollinator-friendly flowers to building habitats and feeding the birds, every small change helps support nature. What’s one thing you do to welcome wildlife to your plot? #WildlifeGarden #AllotmentLife #GrowYourOwn #GardenForNature #PollinatorFriendly #GardeningWithBen #UKGardener #GardenWildlife
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0:00
hello and welcome to gardening with
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previous episodes sit back grab a brew
0:21
and let's enjoy today's episode hello
0:25
and welcome back to
0:27
gardening with Ben for a new episode
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well the weather is certainly being nice
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this week so far the temperatures are a
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lot nicer and yeah it's good gardening
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weather at the moment it's a shame that
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I'm not able to get to the allotment
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this week but oh well the weekend is
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nearly here and I'll be down there on
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Saturday morning and now that it's
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starting to get lighter earlier I'm
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hoping to start getting down to the plot
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a bit earlier usually I get there about
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half 9 10:00 but I'm hoping to start
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getting there from about 8:00 soon and
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start cracking on with getting even more
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done down at the plot because we've got
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to get the ball rolling and get things
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moving along pretty fast now and if I'm
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wanting to get all the improvements done
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on my plot that I'm hoping to get done
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we have got to put the extra time in and
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dedication into getting it done because
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I don't I don't usually stay in the
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afternoon I usually like to get on in
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the morning and spend the rest of the
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afternoon at home relaxing so I'll start
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going down down earlier to the plot and
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hopefully we'll be getting those jobs
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done and yeah I'm certainly happy with
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how it's all coming along um I'm just
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been looking through my old fs and
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usually I've got a lot of my seeds sewn
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by now uh but it has been a bit cooler
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this year so I'm hoping to get them in
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in the next couple of weeks that is the
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plan anyway uh we've still got to sort
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through everything that we are going to
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S so and if we've got anything missing
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um and yeah I I still need to clean out
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all my seed trays and my pots get them
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all washed down get my shed finished get
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my poly tunnel cleared out uh po the
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poly tunnel I won't be using till the
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end of May so we've still got plenty of
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time to get that all cleared out and
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tided because I'll only start using that
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when I plant my tomatoes up and my
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cucumbers and my melons and my or jeans
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and my Peppers we're certainly going to
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have a lot in there this year uh so
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hopefully we'll be getting some great
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crops from in the polyon all this year
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and now that I've repaired it it should
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last for quite a while now and hopefully
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fingers crossed it does because we don't
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want to have to replace that cover um
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it's a big job replacing the cover on
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the polyal digging out all the plastic
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and putting new stuff on but it will
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need doing eventually but we keep keep
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keep the plastic going a bit longer a
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few more years and we'll get it replaced
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eventually and hopefully pretty soon so
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as it's starting to get warmer we need
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to start looking at how we can attract
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the wildlife to our garden and Wildlife
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is extremely
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important part of the garden and the
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allotment and some people might think
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well why but the reason why we need to
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attract the wild life is because it
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helps us with growing the
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produce and I've I've always Tau about
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how we should be attracting the bees to
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the allotment uh that is the number one
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thing to do
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as obviously the bees help with
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pollination the bees help create the
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fruit and the vegetables and without the
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bees you'd be spending ages going around
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pollinating everything yourself on the
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alotment which does take a lot of time
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and effort and you certainly wouldn't
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want to be going around doing that every
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day
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and the chance of getting stuff
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pollinated is a lot harder by doing it
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yourself it's better for the bees to
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just jump around and fly onto different
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flowers and help pollinate stuff so that
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is the key thing that I've been working
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on this year uh to attracting the bees
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to my plot uh for the coming years and
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to help them
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so the next key thing what you need to
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be thinking about at this specific time
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is how to attract the frogs to the
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allotment because adding the frogs to
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the allotment is a very important thing
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to do because we shouldn't be putting
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slug pets down uh there is natural
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methods by using beer or by using copper
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tape and stuff like that but we
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shouldn't they putting slug pets down so
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the best thing to protect the allotment
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from the Slugs is frogs and frogs are
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obviously free um so yeah you need to be
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looking at ways of attracting the frogs
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to the allotment
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and quite a few allotment sites won't
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let you have ponds my allotment site
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doesn't let me have a pond but there is
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Ways and Means around that and by
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meaning that I mean by not having an
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actual Pond but creating a shallow water
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area so that the frogs can use it
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obviously just using a box filled with
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water and making it Pond friendly and
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maybe attracting the frogs to the plot
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that way um the thing around having pwns
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is obviously to stop anyone from falling
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in them and drowning whereas a small box
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there's no chance of that and you
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probably get away with it as as well
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and attracting the frogs obviously
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around now is the best time because they
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will be looking for places to start
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spawning and creating that frog spawn
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and if you can attract the frogs to the
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plot you have got your own slug
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protection away from keeping the Slugs
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down and that is the big thing what you
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have on your plot that can damage all
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your cops and everything
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basically so you need to look at ways of
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getting the frogs to the alotment and
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frogs are lovely as a kid I always used
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to haul frogs and I used to stroke them
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and stuff like that yes I I did used to
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throw them on my
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sisters quite a bad child but yeah uh
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attracting the frogs to the plot is one
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of the best things that you can do if
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you can possibly do it so have a look
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around have a look at creating a
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wildlife area on your plot to attract
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them frogs to the plot and the same goes
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for hedgehogs attra there Hedgehog homes
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what you can create yourself and create
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a warm and welcoming environment for the
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Hedgehogs for them to come on the plot
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obviously you won't see the Hedgehogs
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because they only come out at night if
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you set up a wildlife camera on your
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allotment which I've always wanted to do
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so I may possibly do that eventually uh
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because I'd love to see what Wildlife
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comes down on my plot at night uh have a
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look look at getting a wildlife camera
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and seeing if you can get hedgehogs on
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your plot because again they will eat
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the Slugs and slugs come out at night
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they don't often come out in the daytime
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they come out at the night time and that
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is one of the reasons why a good
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gardening tip is if you want to water
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your plot water it in the morning before
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the sun and heat comes out because the
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Slugs don't come out in the daytime as
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often as the night time a lot of people
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tend to water the plots at night but
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that is when the frogs are attracted to
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the Garden so you're just creating
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yourself a bad way of gardening if you
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water at night rather than in the
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morning so attracting the Hedgehogs is
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another way and then the next big thing
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to eat the slugs are the birds yes
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attracting Birds to your allotment and
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obviously if you're attracting the birds
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to the allotment by seed or bread or
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other
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ways they will spot the slgs crawling
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around on the alotment and they will
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come down and swoop in and pinch them
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and eat them and that is what you want
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to do so attracting the birds onto your
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allotment is a big thing obviously you
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want to watch out for attracting pigeons
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onto your alotment because they will
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decimate your brassicas they absolutely
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love brassas broad
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beans yeah plots can be devastated by
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pigeons so you need to be careful of
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obviously keeping stuff pigeon proof but
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attracting the smaller birds to your
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plot is a big must and something that
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you should try and
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do so yeah attracting the wildlife to
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the plot is very important and I'd say
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it's high on the priority list of things
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to do so obviously I've been working on
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getting the bees to the plot so my next
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task will be to try and get the frogs on
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the allotment because I do want frogs on
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my I absolutely love them love them to
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pieces and it's a good thing to have on
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your plot and also I'm going to be
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looking at getting bird stations around
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my plot uh feeding the birds obviously
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that costs money uh keeping the feeders
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filled up but hopefully we can get
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something sorted and start attracting
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those birds to the alotment because
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they're lovely to see as well when
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you're down at the alotment I've got a
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quite a few Robbins that pop down and as
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I'm digging over beds they'll come in
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pinch them worms and then fly off again
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but they're absolutely lovely to see and
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seeing different varieties of birds as
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well there's different bird seeds out
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there what will attract different birds
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to the allotment so yeah have a look
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around see what you can do let me know
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what you're going to plan to do in the
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wildlife areas of your allotment and how
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you're going to attract the wildlife to
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your plot send me a message it's always
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great to hear from you and I'd love to
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hear what ideas you've got have
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attracting wildli to your plot and yeah
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keep up the good work we'll be back with
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a new podcast tomorrow as always talking
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about all the things that we need to be
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preparing for for the weekend down at
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the allotment so I hope you all have a
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fantastic day everybody the weekend is
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nearly here thank goodness I nearly said
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something
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El but yep the weekend is nearly here so
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until next time remember keep smiling
11:02
keep gardening and keep listening to
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