People feel better when they are surrounded by nature – the wilder the area, with more different types of plants and animals, the better you feel. Inviting birds, butterflies, bees, wildflowers and trees into your garden won’t just help the planet. It will help you, too

Gardening for Biodiversity

A new book, Gardening for Biodiversity, created by nature expert Juanita Browne and illustrator Barry Reynolds, is your step-by-step guide to helping the insects, flowers, birds and other creatures who call your garden home. The book, which can be downloaded here has been recently launched by Laois County Council with the assistance of Local Authority Heritage Officers across Ireland, and with support from the National Parks and Wildlife Service and The Heritage Council.

Gardening for Biodiversity.pdf (size 17 MB) 

Roscommon County Council have FREE copies of Gardening for Biodiversity to give away, with thanks to National Biodiversity Action Plan funding from the Department of Culture, Heritage & the Gaeltacht. If you would like a copy please email heritage@roscommoncoco.ie and we will post one out to you as soon as we can.  

Check out the Gardening for Biodiversity Colouring Sheets! You can download them here. They are reproduced here with thanks to Laois County Council.

Grow it Yourself

Grow It Yourself has great tips and ideas for the budding gardening enthusiast. The website includes a useful month by month calendar giving ideas for what to sow/harvest/or prepare that month. And don’t think it is too late to start gardening this year, there are some handy winter veg that can still be sown!

Grow It Yourself are also launching their Grow it Forward programme, which is designed to help the nation eat well by inspiring and supporting people to grow, cook and eat some of their own food at home. Participants will register through their local library to grow some of their own food with a free GIY starter kit and encouraged to ‘grow it forward’ to 9 others by passing on seeds, seedlings or produce

Bord Bia have a wonderful gardening section on their website, with useful growing tips, information on the benefits of gardening, and lots more