A new survey being launched by the National Trust today will combine two particularly British passions of gardening and wildlife to help find out how much wildlife is hiding in its historic gardens.

Whether it’s the most manicured of lawn or most tended border these can be real havens for an interesting array of wildlife.

The organisation is appealing to the small army of amateur naturalists and wildlife enthusiasts who visit their gardens to record any interesting wildlife they see and to send their records to gardenwildlifesurvey@nationaltrust.org.uk. Records on insects, fungi, birds, reptiles, amphibians, mammals and lower plants such as mosses and lichens are all of interest.

The aim of the survey is to discover and celebrate the wealth of hidden nature in National Trust gardens from the grandeur of Sissinghurst in Kent to the magical Coleton Fishacre in Devon.

Matthew Oates, National Trust Nature Conservation Adviser and the brains behind the survey, said:

Four UK firsts found in Trust gardens are:

• A mistletoe bug (Hyseloecus visci) at Barrington Court in Somerset
• A paper wasp (Polistes dominulus) at Ham House in Richmond
• A lauxanid fly (Homoneura interstincta) at Montacute in Somerset
• A snail (Papillifera papillaris) at Cliveden in Buckinghamshire

A team of volunteers will feed the results into a central database and send on any more notable finds to national and county recording schemes. The Trust will use the results to inform garden plans and make sure wildlife is encouraged wherever possible. For example, the timing of hedge cutting to provide for nesting birds, re-pointing of walls to consider masonry bees and mowing of lawns to respect fungi and grassland flowers.

Matthew added: 'Formal gardens and wildlife don’t need to be mutually exclusive. The two can go hand in hand and they uniquely combine two quintessentially British passions.'