BEAVERS and their important role as natural rewilders will take centre stage at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show later this year.
The habitat-creating, flood-preventing animals will be the showpiece of landscape designers Urquhart & Hunt's garden exhibition, revealing how this keystone species is pivotal to ecosystem restoration, and showcasing how rewilding can benefit nature, climate and people.
Designed for and in collaboration with the charity Rewilding Britain, it shows a rewilding landscape in the south west of England, following the reintroduction of the beaver. Five 'statement trees' are among its stand out features.
A brook flows beneath a glade of hawthorn, hazel and field maple and under a winding old West Country stone wall. Below is a pool dammed by beavers with a beaver’s lodge built around a large crack willow. Evidence of their food and dam supplies – wood- sticks, woodchip and tree debris – are scattered around. Rivulets of water trickle through the dam and spread out across a riparian meadow through rejuvenating alder trees.
Rebecca Wrigley, Rewilding Britain’s chief executive, said: “For the first time at Chelsea, visitors will be shown the amazing rewilding impact that eco-engineers such as beavers can have on reversing the loss of nature in Britain and in boosting the beauty and biodiversity of our landscapes.
"We’re thrilled that Urquhart & Hunt’s inspiring garden will be spotlighting rewilding’s message of hope.”
The garden’s dry-stone wall is built in a West Country traditional style using stone from a previously dis-used but now carefully managed dormant iron-ore quarry in Exmoor. The beaver hide and dam are constructed from debris that has been removed from beaver sites as part of the beaver management process.
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An old timber walkway, made from reclaimed oak planks and chestnut poles, is inspired by the Neolithic Sweet Track from the Somerset levels. It leads across the wetland meadow to a viewing hide at the side of the pool. Native wildflowers mingle with grasses in the garden’s varied planting zones, while marginal plants throng the edges of the pool and stream.
Approximately 3,600 plants are being grown for the garden, with five statement trees, ten shrubby trees and a rough, naturally grown out, hedge. The plants include: Crack Willow (Salix alba), vital in preventing riverside soil erosion and supporting over 200 species of invertebrate; Hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna) - the bright red haw berries are a favourite food for many birds in winter, while Brimstone moth and Oak Eggar moth feed on the leaves and it is a habitat for 149 insect species; Alder (Alnus glutinosa) - supports at least 90 insect species, while its fruit is an important food source for goldfinches, siskin and redpoll; and Devil’s bit scabious (Succisa pratensis) - a vital food source for the caterpillars of the Marsh Fritillary butterfly.
Speaking about the opportunity of creating this garden at RHS Chelsea Flower Show, Lulu Urquhart and Adam Hunt say: "Our garden for Rewilding Britain celebrates something we really feel passionate about which is nature in balance.
"It is more pressing than ever for us as humans to re-connect with our own habitat, the earth, and work within the systems that hold us and give us clean air, waters, nourishment and our home.
"This is our moment to bring this, in all its beauty, to visitors of the show.“
The flower show will run from Tuesday, May 24, until Saturday, May 28.
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