Transform Your Backyard into a Bird Sanctuary: Effortless Methods to Attract Aviary Inhabitants
Turn your garden into a bird-friendly paradise! Who doesn't love the charm of hearing birds chirping and watching them flit about every day? Let's dive into creating the perfect garden for feathered friends so you, too, can enjoy these delightful creatures in your very own backyard.
Crafting a Bird-Friendly Garden
Attracting birds is more than just scattering seed trays. If you're a bird-watching enthusiast, you probably have an array of bird feeders already scattered around your yard.
But have you considered creating a year-round garden for the birds? There is a variety of shrubs and trees that provide food for all four seasons, ensuring your backyard can be a bird haven all year long. Let's examine plants that you can incorporate to make your garden a bird paradise, regardless of the season.
Seasons of Spring
When it's time for spring gardening, whether you have an established landscape plan or are just beginning, remember to include dwarf fruit trees, berry bushes, and a grapevine or two. These can easily be integrated into your design, providing spring blooms that attract insect eaters such as warblers and orioles and providing food for the bees.
Summer Sunshine
A summer garden for birds should include a cherry tree, chokecherry, honeysuckle, raspberry, service-berry, blackberry, blueberry, plum, and elderberry. These plants produce fruit or berries from May through August, attracting a variety of birds like cardinals, brown thrashers, catbirds, robins, thrushes, waxwings, woodpeckers, orioles, towhees, and grosbeaks.
If you're looking to draw a flock of birds, consider planting a mulberry tree. However, be mindful that a mulberry tree requires a good-sized property, as they grow tall, and their fruit can be rather messy. Prepare for the occasional purple splash on the driveway and surrounding areas!
Colorful Fall Scenes
In the fall, there is a significant increase in migratory birds checking out your feeders, trying to build their fat reserves for the journey ahead. Shrubs and trees that provide food for these guests, as well as early feeding for the residents, include:
- Dogwoods
- Mountain ash
- Winter-berries
- Cotoneasters
- Buffalo-berries
It is essential to provide feed, whether from your natural garden or in seed feeders, during this time of year, so that both migratory and non-migratory birds can build their fat reserves.
Winter Warmth
While much of the fruit isn't edible for birds until it has frozen and thawed several times, there are still many plants that will bear fruit in the fall. Some examples are:
- Glossy black chokecherry
- Snow-berry
- Bittersweet
- Sumac
- American high-bush cranberry
- Eastern and European wahoo
- Virginia creeper
- China berry
Some people plant crab apple trees for the birds, but many of the hybrids of that species have fruit that is not edible. If possible, opt for an old variety of crab-apple tree.
Bonus Ideas: Nutty Delights!
Nut-bearing trees offer not only food but also hiding and nesting areas for the birds. Some examples are hickory, buckeye, chestnut, and oak trees.
If you're curious about the importance of birds in your garden, read the benefits of birds in your garden.
Expanding Your Invitation
Apart from planting trees and shrubs, there are additional ways to attract birds to your backyard:
- Provide a source of water, such as a bird bath, small pond, or waterfall.
- Create nesting areas by adding birdhouses or leaving deadwood and hollow trees.
- Plant some insect-friendly plants, as insects are a vital food source for birds.
- Avoid pesticides, as they can harm both the birds and their food sources.
Now, you're better equipped to create a beneficial garden for the birds and enjoy their companionship all year long.
Contributions by Adriana
- Adriana Copaceanu - A nature enthusiast and resident of the country, Adriana propagates a love for nature on her dream property filled with vegetables, lavender, and wildflowers. In addition to spending time with her chickens and planning her next nature project, Adriana has shared her experiences and knowledge through the following books:
- How to Grow Lavender for Fun and Profit: Lessons Learned from Planting Three Hundred Lavender Plants
- How to Raise Chickens for Eggs: A Guide to Raising Happy, Healthy Chickens for Nutritious, Organic Eggs at Home
- Adriana, a nature enthusiast, grows organic vegetables, lavender, and wildflowers in her garden, creating a lifestyle that seamlessly blends home-and-garden with gardening.
- In her book, "How to Grow Lavender for Fun and Profit: Lessons Learned from Planting Three Hundred Lavender Plants", Adriana shares the value of cultivating lavender not only for aesthetic purpose but also for its practical uses.
- Adriana's second book, "How to Raise Chickens for Eggs: A Guide to Raising Happy, Healthy Chickens for Nutritious, Organic Eggs at Home", offers insights into rearing chickens for a plentiful supply of eggs and the benefits of raising poultry in a natural setting.
- To attract bird species that enjoy feasting on insects, Adriana incorporates flowering plants such as dwarf fruit trees, berry bushes, and honeysuckle into her spring garden, providing a bounty of food for warblers, orioles, and bees.
