For illustrated talks on natural history and history see www.peterlovetttalks.co.uk

For illustrated talks on natural history and history click here for www.peterlovetttalks.co.uk

Friday 18 January 2019

Goldfinch eating Lavender seed heads this freezing morning in a Sussex garden, UK.



Conventional advice is to prune lavender after flowering.
If you do NOT prune the seed heads, then they are a feast for seed eating birds like this goldfinch on this freezing, frosty January morning.
This is illustrated in a talk "The evolution of a formal garden to a nature reserve" at http://www.peterlovetttalks.co.uk/page19.html 
Click on the pictures to enlarge or play the video.

6 comments:

Neena said...

I was about to deadhead my lavender this week, but I will hold off now. I had about 6-8 goldfinches stop by to feed on the seeds this morning. All these years growing it, I've never seen this happen! This is in Oregon, USA. I notice your Goldfinches have a red stripe on the head, where ours do not.
Cheers!

Sussexrambler said...

Thanks for that Neena. I'm much encouraged.

Anonymous said...

I'm in Oregon too. I just saw a goldfinch for the first time eating my lavender!

Anonymous said...

I'm in England and am watching a finch strip my lavender bush on this freezing cold morning - have never seen this before.

Anonymous said...

It is time that nature loving gardeners stopped cutting back lavender until early spring

Anonymous said...

I definitely will leave pruning lavender until later. Two beautiful goldfinches today on the one plant I hadn’t cut back. All grasses etc I have always left alone for a good while. Never thought about lavender. I will now!

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