Up next in 10
This video explains how to make a garden or allotment more welcoming for birds and other wildlife. It shows simple ways to provide food, water and shelter to encourage regular visits.
The guide covers suitable feeders, fresh water, safe nesting areas and planting choices that support natural food sources. It also explains how creating a wildlife-friendly space benefits both birds and the overall health of a garden.
If you want to attract more birds and support local wildlife, this video provides practical beginner-friendly advice on building a wildlife-friendly outdoor space.
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hello and welcome to gardening with Ben
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relax grab a brew and let's enjoy
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today's gardening podcast with
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Ben hello and welcome back to gardening
0:45
with Ben for a brand new podcast today I
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hope you're all well well we've recorded
0:51
this in advance ready for you for today
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as the day what I'm recording this on
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was absolutely Ching it down so far I'll
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record a few podcast and then you've got
1:01
something to listen to this
1:04
week and yeah we have been busy at the
1:08
allotment the other day which we
1:09
mentioned about in yesterday's podcast
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and what we're getting up to in
1:15
hopefully the next few weeks down there
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in getting it all ready and prepared for
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the year to come because this year I do
1:22
want a good crop of fruit from my plot I
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want a good crop of vegetables and I
1:28
want some really nice flowers growing
1:31
down there this year we'll talk about
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what we want to grow this year in an
1:36
upcoming episode and some of the new
1:38
things what I might try this year down
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at the allotment so stay tuned for that
1:43
episode coming
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up so what are we talking about today
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well today we're going to be talking
1:49
about looking after the wildlife in your
1:52
alotment and the subject we're going to
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be talking about is looking after the
1:57
birds because
2:00
recently well last year mainly I started
2:04
looking after the birds in my allotment
2:07
I purchased some bird feeders and I
2:11
started feeding the birds getting all
2:13
different types of bird seed for the
2:15
allotment um not knowing what sort of
2:18
variety to purchase I just looked at the
2:19
packets and it said this is for such and
2:21
such a bird this is for such and such a
2:23
bird so I went out and purchased some
2:26
for the
2:27
birds and the absolutely loved it they
2:31
ABS they devoured it and yes it can
2:34
attract mice and rats to the allotment
2:36
and the squirrels uh can also help the
2:39
themselves but it did attract a lot of
2:41
birds to the alotment and I do love
2:43
seeing different varieties of birds at
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the alotment especially blue tits I do
2:48
love to see the blue tits and the
2:49
Robbins down there and hopefully I get
2:52
plenty of different other varieties down
2:55
on the plot as well so we're going to be
2:57
working towards trying to hopefully
2:59
encourage more and more varieties of
3:01
birds to my allotment and one of the
3:04
reasons why I do like to attract the
3:06
birds to my plot is because I hang the
3:09
bird feeders up in my fruit trees and
3:12
fruit trees can be a common ground for
3:16
lots of hibernating caterpillars moths
3:19
ants insects all different varieties
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hiding in between the branches and stuff
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like that and attracting the birds onto
3:26
the trees will help a meum and hopefully
3:30
keep away all the pests that are
3:34
affecting the fruit trees and what can
3:36
cause problems so the more you can get
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the birds into the fruit trees the
3:40
better really
3:42
and last year I went out and purchased
3:46
some bird boxes uh I thought I'll I'll
3:49
give I'll give it a try seeing if we can
3:51
get some birds uh nested on the plot and
3:55
I didn't know what bird houses to
3:57
purchase whatsoever so I just went
4:00
online on Amazon and purchased some ones
4:02
at a reasonable price and yeah I put
4:06
them up and I I didn't really look on
4:10
instructions on what you should do and
4:12
where you should put them to be honest
4:14
um I just put a couple on the side of my
4:16
shed near where my bird feeders were and
4:21
literally within a couple of hours of
4:25
putting that bird house up blue tits
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were going in and out of them inspecting
4:30
him I thought wow this can't be true I
4:33
literally have put this birdh house up
4:35
and they literally moving in looking at
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them straight away and having a look
4:40
around and I thought wow this is
4:43
fantastic and then within a couple of
4:46
days they were going in and out putting
4:48
all making all the nests creating all
4:50
the little homes for the themselves and
4:52
I thought blah mean this is fantastic
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there not knowing anything about Blu tis
4:57
and everything and like my family R bird
5:00
houses and they've never had any blue
5:01
tits in them and stuff like that I
5:03
thought I'm doing all right yeah and
5:06
after a few months I got some babies in
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there I could hear them uh squawking and
5:12
I like oh fantastic unfortunately I
5:16
couldn't see in I didn't want to disturb
5:18
them I didn't want to open it up because
5:20
they could uh the parents could leave
5:22
them and they could then die and uh fade
5:25
away and they could abandon them I
5:27
thought no I'm going to leave them I'm
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going to leave them as they are so we
5:30
left them and I watched them fledge and
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it was absolutely amazing um to watch
5:37
blue tis down on my allotment move into
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this home and encourage the different
5:43
birds onto the
5:44
plot uh I often have Robin come watching
5:48
me while I'm doing my gardening and I
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dig up all the worms and I throw them to
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the Robin and everything like that I've
5:55
not had one land on my hand yet uh that
5:58
is one thing that I do want to try and
6:00
do cuz they are pretty tame Robins uh
6:03
and you often see pictures of people
6:05
feeding Robbins from the hand uh but
6:07
we'll see about that we'll see if we
6:09
manage to do it one day but yeah I've
6:12
got these bird houses and obviously now
6:16
is the time to start cleaning out them
6:18
bird houses from last year um especially
6:21
if they've got nests in them um you do
6:23
need to get them all cleaned out because
6:25
you won't get any blue tis moving in
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while there looks like there's a chance
6:30
that something's already nested there uh
6:33
so we've got that job to do we've got to
6:35
take them down which I'm not looking
6:36
forward to cuz I'm wondering if there'll
6:38
be any spiders hiding in them and stuff
6:39
like that uh but we'll take them down
6:42
unscrew them and empty the nests out and
6:44
give them a good clean out with
6:46
disinfectant and to stop any diseases
6:49
what have been lurking around in there
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and stuff like that so we're going to
6:52
give them a good clean out and put them
6:53
back up so yeah I'm hoping that we can
6:56
get some more blue tits down at the
6:58
allotment again this year
7:00
because that would be great because just
7:02
sitting there watching them most of the
7:04
time flying in and out of the nest
7:06
they're so fast at flying in and out
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it's unbelievable and it's funny because
7:11
like I used to have a bird house as a
7:13
kid and it used to have a little stand
7:15
outside the hole but now they're saying
7:17
that you shouldn't do that uh so these
7:19
ones haven't got stands on them to for
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the birds to stand on they just fly in
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and out like they do and easy as all um
7:28
obviously the hole needs to be at the
7:29
the right size but yeah I'm really happy
7:32
with the bird houses that I've got and
7:33
hopefully we can get some more footage
7:36
again this year down at the plot because
7:39
I'm certainly seing a lot of blue tits
7:41
flying around on my alotment site and
7:44
it's amazing to see um I'm hoping that
7:47
we can get some different varieties of
7:50
birds down there I don't know how you go
7:53
about getting them to nest in bird boxes
7:55
or stuff like that different varieties
7:57
of birds or whether they do actually
7:59
nest in bird boxers it's something that
8:01
I do need to look up and see about doing
8:05
um but we are going to try and get
8:07
different varieties of insects and books
8:10
down there this year uh so we'll be
8:12
talking about that in future episodes of
8:15
what what we're going to try and do this
8:17
year because the more insects and birds
8:20
and butterflies we get down to the
8:22
allotment it all helps with pollination
8:24
and stuff like that the more butterflies
8:26
they spread the pollination between the
8:28
plants and they're amazing to see as
8:30
well so I won't talk too much about that
8:32
because we'll talk about that in another
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episode uh but I am wanting to get some
8:37
different stuff down
8:39
there and it's just amazing I could just
8:42
spend all day literally down at the
8:44
alotment watching different Wildlife
8:46
down there um if you've got plenty of
8:49
different Wildlife on your plot let me
8:51
know let me know what you do to
8:52
encourage the wild life onto your plot
8:55
and what you do to attract the birds if
8:57
you've got any tips and advice as well
8:59
it's is always good to hear from
9:01
everybody uh obviously it's expensive uh
9:03
doing the bird feeders but I only tend
9:05
to do them in the winter time uh I don't
9:08
tend to do them in the summer time
9:09
because there's plenty around for them
9:10
to eat like all the fruit and the
9:12
raspberries and blackberries and stuff
9:14
like that I don't tend to fill the bird
9:16
feeders up in summertime as it can be an
9:19
expensive job because they soon do go
9:21
down these bird feeders it's amazing how
9:24
fast they do actually go down but we'll
9:26
see we'll see how we get on and
9:28
hopefully we can attract lots of
9:30
varieties and hopefully I can get some
9:32
pictures I managed to get a picture of a
9:34
blue TI yesterday uh on the plot uh it
9:37
doesn't look quite old to be honest it
9:39
looked quite youngish um but I don't
9:42
know when the nesting season actually
9:44
starts so we do need to get on cracking
9:47
with clearing out these bird houses
9:49
ready for the year to
9:51
come so yeah we have been busy and
9:55
obviously like I said I've been putting
9:57
plenty of YouTube videos on my new
9:59
YouTube YouTube channel uh so if you've
10:01
not found my YouTube channel it's called
10:03
gardening with Ben it's not a new
10:04
channel actually it's been there for a
10:06
few years but we are going to be putting
10:08
lots of videos on this year I'm really
10:10
going to start trying getting it up and
10:12
running and sharing lots of content with
10:15
you that's the plan for this year
10:17
obviously I do these podcasts and I do
10:19
my Facebook and Instagram post but I
10:21
want to get my videos up and running
10:23
because a lot of people do like to see
10:25
what's happening and actually see
10:27
somebody speaking rather than just
10:29
listen listening as well um so I'm
10:31
hoping to get that up and running and
10:33
get that sorted this year so if you've
10:36
not followed my YouTube channel go and
10:37
find it gardening with Ben and click
10:40
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10:41
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10:43
channels come up and yeah thank you for
10:45
listening to these podcasts I know I've
10:47
received a lot of messages from people
10:49
saying how much they're glad that
10:51
they're back again uh I do tend to
10:53
Waffle on sometimes but but I try to
10:55
make them about 10 minutes long and make
10:58
them interesting and hopefully people
11:00
learn something from it and take
11:02
something away from it so I hope that uh
11:05
those that are listening today you think
11:07
about putting some bird feeders up in
11:09
the alotment or in the garden and
11:12
watching what gets involved and put up a
11:15
bird house as well and see if if you can
11:18
get a blue TI living in your garden this
11:20
year to watch when it fledges and
11:23
everything like that so thanks for
11:25
listening to today's podcast until next
11:27
time remember keep smiling keep
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