Barratt Developments : New RSPB and Barratt guide to making gardens wildlife friendly

03 Sep 2018

As part of its partnership with the RSPB, Barratt Developments has published a new consumer guide to making your garden wildlife friendly. It has been written by wildlife experts from the RSPB and is packed with handy hints and top tips on how to boost the wildlife in your garden.

The guide, called 'Bringing Your Garden to Life' is available for free download from www.barratthomes.co.uk. It gives guidance on the basics of creating a wildlife garden such as providing food and water, making sure wildlife can move between gardens and giving shelter so that animals can stay safe and raise their young.

With 60% of wildlife species in the UK in decline over the past 50 years, and with 31% declining strongly, we all need to play our part to halt and reverse this trend. This is why Barratt and the RSPB have together launched the guide.

The guide gives you an example of how a simple wildlife friendly garden could look, complete with features such as a deadwood pile, hedgehog highway, bat and bird boxes together with a hiding place and drought garden - really important in the current hot weather.

It also gives examples of common wildlife friendly features that people can easily install in their gardens. These include planting wildflower turf, adding in a scented garden to attract bumblebees, using native hedgerows and installing water butts and compost bins.

Mike Clarke, the RSPB's chief executive, said: 'Our gardens can be wonderful places to relax and escape the world, and with a little thought and effort they can play a vital role in providing a much needed haven for wildlife. This is important because nature needs our gardens as once familiar species are being seen and heard less in our towns and countryside. However, we can all make a difference, and this free guide is an excellent place to start for getting some ideas about what you can do in your garden to help nature and enjoy the benefits from birds and other animals visiting throughout the year.'

The new guide lists the best plants to put in your garden and includes such common favourites as honeysuckle, holly, dogwood, lavender and rosemary. It also advises on those you should avoid such as water hyacinth, Japanese rose and Russian vine. Invasive non-native species pose one of the greatest threats to the natural world, costing the UK tax payer £1.7bn a year in compensation for the damage they do.

David Thomas, chief executive of Barratt Developments plc, said: 'The new guide is a fantastic resource for anyone looking to bring their garden to life by making it wildlife friendly. There are lots of simple things we can all be doing and the guide gives advice on things like what to feed birds, how to install bee and bat boxes, providing homes for hedgehogs, what plants to grow and what to pull up. We all want to see wildlife looked after which is why we're working with the RSPB to give nature a home on our developments - and this guide helps everyone to do that.'

ENDS

For further information, please contact:

Derek Harris, head of public relations

Tel, 020 7299 4873 / e-mail, [e-mail]

NOTES TO EDITORS:

Barratt Developments plc sold 17,579 homes in the year to June 2018, making it the biggest housebuilder by volume in Britain. Over the past six years Barratt Group has increased its housing output by more than 55% - building more of the homes the country needs. Barratt is committed to building quality homes and this year received more NHBC Pride in the Job awards than any other housebuilder and retained its HBF 5 star rating for customer satisfaction for 9 years in a row. For more information visit www.barrattdevelopments.co.uk

03 Sep 2018 New RSPB and Barratt guide to making gardens wildlife friendly

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