RAUK - Archived Forum - creating a garden for common lizards?

Hello all*

Im new here, and I happen to adore lizards I own many geckos,and a chameleon.

In the past my cat brought me a live injured slow worm, and I nursed him back to health,I also found an injured smooth newt I also nursed back to health.

I sadly however have never seen a common lizard, but we get lots of frogs and toads in our garden,I reckon our neighbours garden which is a jungle because he never touches it, is a haven for some wildlife!.

I live in Gloucester,and even though I know you do get common lizards in the Gloucestershire area,because we live nearer the city area, i dont know if I have any hope of common lizards visiting our garden.

Firstly i would like to know, is there anyone here from Gloucestershire?

Ok, on to the main reason for my post,the fact is I own a dog and a cat, we only have a small garden, but since I have seen a slow worm,and a smooth newt and we have lots of frogs,I hoped if I create a small rockery, possibly I could encourage common lizards to want to move in?,we are an end semi detached house,beside a lot of trees,its like a small but long woodland area beside us, i dont know exactly what to call it!,as we are in a cul de sac area.Not too far away there is a small park with a working railway area next to it, so its quite near us,I dont know if there are common lizards there, but I heard thats another sort of place they like?

I intend to have a rockery with a small pond long grass and shrubs and flowers, so really its a wildlife garden, I hope to attract bumble bees,hoverflies,butterflies,slugs, snails,dragonflies and many other insects,I especially wish to attract slow worms,newts and common lizards, I have been reseaching like mad the right plants to attract them all,however if anyone who does know other things they like would like to help me with my garden i would really apreciate it, and it would be nice to know it is possible even though i own a dog and cat.

Please can anyone here let me know if this is a good idea or not,as at the moment our garden is bare the frogs have no where to go!

Would anyone know how to make the garden more safe for my hopeful residents???

Thank you for any reply you can give*

PS:LOVE the site*

I live in Devon and have a large garden which I have made attractive for wildlife BUT I would never attract lizards as there are none in the vicinity.

I have slow worms as they live throughout the town in gardens. Grass snakes I get occasionally as they use a stream that adjoins my garden as a corridor to move into the town from the countryside nearby.

It is easier to attract things that can fly in but things that must hop, crawl and slither are more difficult.

My brother manages a wonderful nature reserve in Yorkshire but he is unlikely to get  slow worms or grass snakes as there are none in the area.

Cats are not a good mix with most wildlife really! I have rescued many slow worms from cats here. They will also play with and kill frogs.

Newts you might already have and not realise it as they are fairly secretive creatures.

Why not put down some tins or black plastic sheeting (weighted with bricks or similar) to see if anything goes underneath to bask. If your cat brought one back they must be in the area.

A large log pile attracted common lizards to breed in our garden. We live next to an arable field but a survey of the ditch running up it from the back of the house revealed common lizards to be there.

I built a big pile of logs and added things that don't compost well such as conifer cuttings to it. Very soon we had lizards and baby lizards in the garden.

Cats will be a problem. The more wildlife we attracted the more cats came to sit in the garden. We ended up having to buy an electronic cat deterant. It works very well, not seen a cat in the garden since.

Try what Suz said, use something to do a mini survey of the area like tins also lizards love old tyres in long grass. They sit on them as the tyres warm up even on dull days. If there is anything like that lying about check it now and then to see if lizards do already live near you.

Hi Phillip

Can I ask what did you do to try and attract common lizards?,I just found out recently that there are LOTS of common lizards near our railway afterall*,i know this because a friends cats keep bring them in alive(luckily!)so she has to keep setting them free at the railway!lol.

Due to knowing this is 5-10 mins from me,I was told by others that theres a high chance common lizards are nearer me than i think, as it seems some spread out in the strangest of places,so heres hoping*

Thank you for the advice Suzi and Gemma*

Im probably repeating myself but as I said I know now they could be very near me, I found an old rusty paint can,but which way do I use it?,theres nothing in it,and I could only find a little peice of black carpet,but no bricks,I noticed an old tyre in a little grassy lane just outside,but my boyfriend does not want a tyre he said it will make the garden look tacky!.Cant find any small sheets of metal,but Im thinking of making a log pile as well.I have no where to do a survey check in garden at moment,as theres no grass!,my survey is our neighbours garden its a smaller garden than ours but full of ivy vines branches grasses wood all sorts!the dog ruined all our grass when he was a baby.There are only rocks at the back flat down at the area the garden is going to be, but the rest of the garden the dog needs, so my boyfriend is making a fence so my garden is contained in a safe little area,I just hope to God this all works out,as it means a lot to me to be able to help wildlife,they dont have many places left, thanks to humans!

About putting the cat and dog off,I cant use the electronic cat deterant as i think my cat would leave home!but to put cats off and other predators,I found that the plant called the scaredy cat plant is meant to put both cats and dogs off as they cant stand the smell, well thats got to be better than giving them a headache all day huh?

I also for cover am going to plant a shrub called Barberis Darwinii, if youve not heard of it, it is like a holly bush has spikey leaves and the bonus is beautiful orange little flowers that attract bees,then edible purple berries,that attract birds,Im not really wanting to attract birds but I do love this shrub,we had it in our garden when i was a little girl,and I remember hoverflies landing on me near it,and bumble bees.

I found out the Hosta plant is a magnet for slugs and snails, which i would think is good news if you want to attract wildlife, as slow worms love them!.

Good luck with the log pile, it should work ours did quite quickly. You will need to let some grass grow tall around it to attract grasshoppers and ground spiders for the lizards to eat.

The anti-cat thingy we have isn't all that bad. It works on one of those infra-red beam things like a security light and can be directed. The top third of our garden is left to wildlife the rest is lawn and veggies. By setting the cat deterant up to work just at the top end it keeps cats away from the bird table, pond and log pile, but they can happily walk through the lawn bit without it bothering them. Seems a good compromise without given them too much of a headache as it only goes off if they go in the bit we don't want them, they seemed to have got the idea very quickly.