Bird-Friendly Gardening: Guidance and Projects for Supporting Birds in Your Landscape

 

Bird-Friendly Gardening is the definitive guide to planting a wildlife-welcoming home landscape filled with a diversity of native plants that feed, shelter, and support birds. With hundreds of North American bird species facing population decline or at risk of extinction, right now is the perfect time to create a home-based habitat garden that offers birds the resources they need to safely feed, migrate, breed, and thrive. Thankfully, making your outdoor space a secure and comfortable haven for many different bird species isn’t a Herculean task. It’s a matter of understanding the needs of our avian friends and how native plants, combined with purposeful garden design, can help meet those needs. And that’s exactly the know-how you’ll find here, outlined in a simple-to-follow, actionable format by author Jennifer McGuinness.  Step beyond the seed-filled bird feeder and suet block, and learn how to further provide for birds. Some of the topics covered in the book   How to design a bird-centered habitat garden in spaces large and small  Advice on providing fresh water year-round Understanding the connection between native plants and insects and the birds that rely on them How to design and plant a fruit garden, a bird seed garden, a runoff-absorbing rain garden, or even a container garden that nurtures birds Meet dozens of trees, shrubs, and other plants that support the insects almost all adult birds need to feed their young 18 step-by-step garden design projects and plant lists for creating a diversity of bird-friendly spaces Tips for preventing window strikes and cat kills Best practices for including bird feeders, nest boxes, and bird baths in your landscape Whether your “spark bird” was a lightning-fast Ruby-throated Hummingbird, a brilliant Indigo Bunting, or a petite Hammond’s Flycatcher, it’s time to put out the welcome mat for birds in your home garden. YOU can make a significant impact on the lives of thousands of birds, whether they’re just passing through during migration or making a feather-lined summertime home for raising the next generation. It’s time for gardeners from coast to coast to heed the call and welcome their flighty friends home with Bird-Friendly Gardening. 

Bird-Friendly Gardening gives newbies quite a bit to get started, but there is so much more than what this book offers. I was hoping to find more projects for landscaping ideas but there are only a few diagrams of gardening guides and hardly any for small spaces. This book failed to tell readers of the threat of invasive birds such as House Sparrows and Starlings. If you're truly passionate about native birds you must get to know how to control these birds from killing native birds. 

The upside to this book is it covers a lot of native plants to bring into your yard to help keep birds coming for years to come. What most people fail to realize the majority of our American home's landscaping is all Asian plants that offer no benefit to our native birds or pollinators, for that matter, and Yes, your amazing Crape Myrtle is an Asian plant that offers no benefits to our birds.

Another tip I wished this book would have covered. The majority of our major box stores in the US only offer Asian plants, you'll have to research in your area to find places that sell native plants, and some natives carry crazy expensive price tags. Through the years, I have found that my Masters Gardeners offers a yearly native plant sale that I attend and, Etsy is also a great resource to buy native seeds. 

Go and explore a birding world that will amaze you for years to come. 

Thank you, Netgalley for providing this title for review 

Amazon Affiliate link https://amzn.to/4aPdKWR

Bluebird nest spring 2023

My resident bluebirds were busy early this year. 

   They had their nest built mid-March and I would check every other day or so for eggs and to make sure no house sparrows around them or the nesting box. On the 6th of April, I went to peak in the nesting box and found 5 eggs! Two up from last year's 3. 

If you've never had the opportunity to host bluebirds, they are amazing parents and a joy to have in your yard. Just be warned if, you have house sparrows around, they will kill them, I almost lost the mom last year and learned quick they don't get along. 

I would check every few days to see if any of the eggs had hatched and it wasn't long until I noticed babies on the 15th of April. 

Once they hatched it doesn't take very long before they are ready to fly the nest. On April, 29th I took the picture above and on May 4th the last one left the nest. I hope these babies will make it and make many more native Bluebirds. 

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker

 One of many winter resident birds in my yard includes the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker. 

Have you ever noticed a series of small round holes in your fruit trees or other trees in your yard? Well, then you have one of these beauties visiting your yard.

I’ve seen this handy beak work on my fruit trees for years but, I’ve never been able to catch an image of one until this year. About a week ago I caught a glimpse of a different kind of woodpecker at my suet feeder so, I grabbed my camera to take a picture and set out to find out what kind of woodpecker he or she was. To my surprise, I found out she was a Yellow-bellied Sapsucker.

For years I've noticed neat patterns of holes in my old apple tree and other trees but have never been able to attract this type of woodpecker to a birdfeeder or suet feeder until this year and this leads me to wonder if this could be a new female or if the sap is not too great in my tress this year for her to eat. Either way, she is really cool and is welcome to eat what she wants in my yard. 

If you notice small holes in your tress in a set pattern please don't worry about the tree it will live on. My old apple tree has served for many years and so have my other huge trees. 

One cool fact is hummingbirds love the sap that their sapwells leave behind. 

To find out more about these beauties click here https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Yellow-bellied_Sapsucker/overview

Hummingbrid moths

This past year I had some interesting pollinators around my flower garden. I had no clue where they came from until now.

Clearwing or hummingbird moths' host plants are honeysuckle, snowberry, cherry, and plum native trees and shrubs. 

Have you ever seen hummingbird moths in your yard? 

A gardener I follow on Youtube made a video about these amazing moths and you can watch it here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BboAytEJaY

You can learn more about them by the links below. 

https://www.fs.fed.us/wildflowers/pollinators/pollinator-of-the-month/hummingbird_moth.shtml

https://nature.mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/field-guide/sphinx-moths-hawk-moths

Book Review of The Pollinator Victory Garden: Win the War on Pollinator Decline with Ecological Gardening; Attract and Support Bees, Beetles, Butterflies, Bats, and Other Pollinators by Kim Eierman

Title: The Pollinator Victory Garden: Win the War on Pollinator Decline with Ecological Gardening; Attract and Support Bees, Beetles, Butterflies, Bats, and Other Pollinators 

Author: Kim Eierman

Source: Netgalley

The passion and urgency that inspired WWI and WWII Victory Gardens is needed today to meet another threat to our food supply and our environment—the steep decline of pollinators. The Pollinator Victory Garden offers practical solutions for winning the war against the demise of these essential animals.

Pollinators are critical to our food supply and responsible for the pollination of the vast majority of all flowering plants on our planet. Pollinators include not just bees, but many different types of animals, including insects and mammals. Beetles, bats, birds, butterflies, moths, flies, and wasps can be pollinators.

But, many pollinators are in trouble, and the reality is that most of our landscapes have little to offer them. Our residential and commercial landscapes are filled with vast green pollinator deserts, better known as lawns. These monotonous green expanses are ecological wastelands for bees and other pollinators.

With The Pollinator Victory Garden, you can give pollinators a fighting chance. Learn how to transition your landscape into a pollinator haven by creating a habitat that includes pollinator nutrition, larval host plants for butterflies and moths, and areas for egg laying, nesting, sheltering, overwintering, resting, and warming. Find a wealth of information to support pollinators while improving the environment around you:
 •  The importance of pollinators and the specific threats to their survival•  How to provide food for pollinators using native perennials, trees, and shrubs that bloom in succession•  Detailed profiles of the major pollinator types and how to attract and support each one•  Tips for creating and growing a Pollinator Victory Garden, including site assessment, planning and planting goals•  Project ideas like pollinator islands, enriched landscape edges, revamped foundation plantings, meadowscapes, and other pollinator-friendly lawn alternatives
 The time is right for a new gardening movement. Every yard, community garden, rooftop, porch, patio, commercial, and municipal landscape can help to win the war against pollinator decline with The Pollinator Victory Garden.

I look for ways to help win the war for the decline of our pollinators because I really need those pollinators for my vegetable garden. When I started my raised beds over 6 years ago I had tons of bees in my garden so I had a great harvest but over the past couple of years I am lucky to see one lone bee on my vegetable flowers so I know there is something wrong.

I work in a garden center and I have increased my flowers over the past few years, I have increased in butterflies, birds and I even have some hummingbird months each year but my bees are just not increasing. I was hoping this book would help and I think it has, I have failed to add house for the bees so this is my project for this year.

This book does not give you a list of each flower that will attract each pollinator, this book is to help you make better choices. We see a pretty flower and just automatically think it will attract pollinators but they don’t. This book will help you chose better flowers that they will like, better water sources and housing sources.