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Garden soldiers

Not everything in the garden is happy with this rain. I’m sure we have had more than our fair share of Smith Periods (the humid conditions which bring dreaded tomato and potato blight), and the aubergine was looking so grumpy I brought it inside. But under the raspberry canes, a frog has set up camp, and I am ever so glad.

Frogs are fantastic garden soldiers, namely because they just love eating slugs. Big ones, small ones, yellow ones, black ones; they aren’t fussy. So frogs are always welcome in our garden. I’ve even set up some little habitats for them, just so they know how welcome they are.

Frogs need moist conditions if they are going to make your garden their home. This means a little pond, with a shallow end to help them clamber out after a swim, and a few damp places to shelter and find bugs and slugs. I have placed old, rotting logs at the back of my compost heap and under bushes to encourage this, as well as making sure there are plenty of bushes and plants to hide behind. The only rent the frogs pay is keeping my enormous cos lettuces free of slimy diners.

It has also been a fantastic year for ladybirds, and a little colony is setting up shop. This is fantastic news for my roses and any other plants susceptible to aphid attack. Garlic and chilli sprays might repel aphids, but a ladybird colony means they are gone for good.

The first step to encouraging ladybirds (and other beneficial insects) is to stop using nasty pesticides. You might have to grit your teeth for a few weeks as the aphids hold large-scale parties on your rosebuds, but that is a small price to pay for establishing an effective, long-lasting and free ecosystem in your garden.

You’ll also need to provide shelter: a few piles of dead leaves under bushes for hibernation, or a bug hotel. And, as long as they have enough aphids to eat (which, let’s face it, is rarely a problem in most gardens), they will breed happily and produce hungry larvae who will in turn gobble up even more nasties.

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