Don't stint on the creature comforts

I'M GIVING garden space to 10 goldfinches now, but because only four can perch on the nyger feeder at any one time, they've become exceedingly yobbish.

Bad-tempered aerial battles and chavvy squawking is the norm now that the weather has turned wintry, and one of the juveniles is perilously close to an Asbo .

Meanwhile, the squirrel has chomped his way through so many peanuts it's touch and go whether he'll be able to leap from the fence to the feeder for much longer.

And whenever I'm innocently doing a few chores in the garden I get sworn at by impatient tits massing in the top of the lilac tree, urging me indoors so they can get on and eat some nuts before the lot have disappeared into the squirrel's pot belly.

Winter brings out the worst in wildlife. Especially the mammals and birds that hang around the one garden in the area that caters solely to their needs - mine.

But I don't begrudge them because someone has to make amends for all the wildlife-unfriendly zones, decked and concreted, embellished with planters containing one cordyline apiece, lined up with anal precision. There's no help for ladybirds or hedgehogs there.

Actually, I despair of ever seeing a hedgehog again round our way, but I've got a nice two-roomed MDF home ready just in case one ever ambles by.

It's sad to think of all those Mrs Tiggy-Winkles crawling their way into bonfire mounds, to be fried to a crisp tonight, when there's a nice house with vacant possession all ready for one of them.

And when I say "crawling", I mean the ones that haven't already had their legs strimmed off by Jeremy Clarkson-style boys with toys.

I have gathered fallen leaves and stacked them in sheltered corners around the garden for the benefit of bugs, bees and butterflies to overwinter among.

My stag beetle log pile will provide yet more cover, along with a couple of bundles of hollow bamboo sticks, cut into shorter lengths and tied into bundles.

I'm leaving annual and perennial seedheads intact, as home for tiny bugs, too. And now I'm going to leave them all in peace, to survive the cold as best they can.

If the sight of a Red Admiral sipping nectar from a purple hebe in November sunlight leaves you unmoved, then don't waste your valuable time doing any of these things.

But if it does please you, if only for a second, do offer the insect a warm refuge in your garden in which to survive the winter. And spare a thought for the hedgehogs tonight.