With a few easy steps, your garden can become a haven for wildlife...

Flowers: Choose plants that provide pollen and nectar for as long a season as possible, from spring (Crocus and Mahonia for example) through to autumn (Michaelmas daisy - pictured below - Sedum spectabile and ivy, which is particularly late to bloom and may provide food into early winter). Studies such as the RHS Plants for Bugs project are helping us understand how both native and non-native plants support garden wildlife.

The Northern Echo:

Trees and shrubs: As well as providing food in the form of flowers, fruits and seeds, the right trees and shrubs provide cover and nesting sites for garden animals, from insects to larger species such as birds.

Mature trees: If your garden is too small for big trees, find out if it is possible to get some planted in your neighbourhood, and protect those that are already there – large street trees provide a vital habitat for a range of wildlife.

Water feature: The single easiest way to add wildlife value to a garden is to install a pond, however tiny - a large pot or even an inverted dustbin lid in an out-of-the-way spot will do.

Dead wood: Decaying wood provides an ever-rarer habitat to a range of specialist wildlife that is growing increasingly uncommon in the countryside, such as stag beetles (pictured below) and bark beetles and their grubs, and many species of fungi. It also provides cover and hibernation sites. Any unstained or unpainted wood is suitable, although big, natural logs are best, ideally partly buried.

The Northern Echo:

Compost: Composting your garden waste helps all your garden plants and wildlife, as it speeds up the natural recycling of nutrients by harnessing native decomposer organisms (saprophytes), especially fungi and soil bacteria.

Provide food and water for birds all year: Ideally, offer a mix of food including peanuts, sunflower hearts, seeds, kitchen scraps and fat balls, or proprietary seed mixtures, to supplement natural food such as berries and seeds. Don't forgot that a supply of clean, unfrozen water is just as vital for feathered.

The Northern Echo:

Don’t be too tidy: This doesn't mean your garden has to look a mess, but piles of leaves and twiggy debris provide both food and habitat for many species. Allow a patch of grass to grow longer.

And once you've created the right environment to attract wildlife, it's important to care for the animals all year round.