LETTING THE WILD IN

Like many gardeners, Alice Vincent used to want to feel in control of her garden space, but now she is learning to let go a little and welcome in the wildness

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It happens about once a week – I emerge from bed to inspect the garden, and find that something has been rummaging in the night. A broken stem of last summer’s growth here, half a chewed-up glove there, a plastic compost bag trawled across the lawn. I imagine it’s a particularly wily fox, but if so, they always close the shed door behind them. Playful, yes, but considerate. 

This kind of thing might have bothered me once. I’ve found all sorts in the garden: cat poo, cat-caught pigeons, rat burrows, sweet wrappers and burnt-out tealights from revelries past. There was the weekend I went to Glastonbury and received a particularly grisly message from the husband about a deceased rat the “size of a loaf of bread” splayed elegantly on a patio slab. I live a stone’s throw from one of south London’s main arteries, so it was never going to be bucolic, but I still harboured that gardening arrogance that this was my space: how dare something come and use it as a toilet/playpark/graveyard?