Would you recognise a nettle if you came across one? You may have seen a recent report published in ‘The Independent’. A poll of 1000 children aged 5-16 showed half of England’s children wouldn’t, and that 83% couldn’t identify a bumblebee.

The report also found this wouldn’t surprise a quarter of parents because they felt their children weren’t interested in ‘nature’.

In my experience, children are curious about everything, so before blaming them, it’s worth asking how knowledgeable the parents actually were and whether they encouraged their children to find out more about the natural world.

Our gardens make the ideal starting point for this. We should share children’s curiosity and learn what’s happening in them.

Start by looking carefully at the garden, not merely glancing at it on the way to the car. You’ll start asking questions and turning to Mr Google for help, and encourage children to do this rather than moaning about the time they spend on their phones.

Children are fascinated by things that move, so butterflies, bees, beetles and worms, all hard at work, will grab their attention. Even worldly-wise 12 year old girls are keen to watch and sometimes touch the worms they’re learning about: how they breed, the ‘saddle’ on their backs, how much they eat, and how long they live.

There’s so much to see. Look for the different types of worms: the surface dwellers breaking down leaves; ones carting leaf segments underground; and the tunnellers, doubling the nutritional value of soil passing through their bodies.

Bumblebees are fun to watch and only sting if attacked or stood on. Look at flowers: which ones attract the bees and hoverflies? Why? Learn from the kids and take photos and videos on your phones and use this to find out more.

Why do flowers go to the trouble of producing nectar to attract insects? Which flowers actually have nectar and are useful to wildlife, not just sterile and pretty for us?

We enjoy seeing butterflies as they flit around. And when you look closely, they have a tale to tell. Take Painted Ladies and Cabbage Whites. Both are intrepid travellers. On leaving our gardens in autumn, the tiny Painted Ladies set off on an unimaginable journey to North Africa, returning the following spring. And over a few generations, Cabbage Whites reach Spain.

Yet we love gorgeous Painted Ladies but loathe the Cabbage Whites. We’re happy that Painted Lady caterpillars eat thistle leaves, but hate the cabbage leaf strippers. The lesson is obvious: although we can protect our precious cabbages, we can’t and shouldn’t try to eradicate anything we consider a ‘pest’. We’re part of nature, not above it.

And, as you’d expect me to say, plants are endlessly fascinating. We can see the ground fertilised in spring with compost, plants emerging, growing, dying and turning back to compost in autumn. What techniques do they all use reproduce successfully. Why do some plants thrive and others fail in different parts of the garden?

Look at all the different shapes and sizes of our plants. They’ve been developed for specific reasons. Why are there flowers with flat open tops, cup-shaped or tubular? Watch them all and see which insects are attracted to these shapes.

Why are some leaves thin, others fleshy, narrow or broad? What happens to deciduous leaves throughout the growing season? Why not take pictures from bud burst to leaf fall? Why are they a fresh green in spring, fading towards in the end of summer? What happens to leaves when they change colour in the autumn?

I could go on and on. But folk who think they know all the answers are kidding themselves.

Plant of the week

Chelone glabra flowers from late summer and prefers moist soil. Its white flowers have rounded tops and cluster close to the stem, they are particularly effective in partial shade.