I love the sound of the birds chirping as I tool around in my garden–it’s such a tweet, ahem, treat.
If you want to turn your backyard into a bird-lovers paradise, here are a few sure-fire tips to ensure that you are a good bird hostess:
- Provide plenty of fresh water for drinking and bathing. This is especially true in the winter, when birdie resources are a little more scarce. Birds will stay close to a consistent, clean water source.
- Provide a variety of feed. Since variety is the spice of life, providing a couple of different feeders with different types of bird seed will increase your odds of lots of types of birds.
- Plant pine trees. In the winter, quite a few types of birds seek the protective qualities of pine trees. They can hide easily from predators and pines provide a little more shelter from the elements.
- No pine trees? No problem. Put a pile of branches and twig in the corner of the yard. A lot of birds prefer to make their homes on the ground in the safety of thick brush trimmings.
- If possible, provide running water. The sound of running water will attract birds from miles away. Obviously, this is easier to do in the summer, when fountains, etc. are on.
- A lot of birds dine consistently on bugs, but will supplement with fruits. Cut up apples or shrubs with fruits {think holly, elderberry, honeysuckle, etc.} provide another supplemental food source that will draw in the birds.
- Clean out bird houses {if you have them} yearly. Birdhouses can foster bugs and parasites, so for the safety of any new inhabitants, it’s best to give them a good cleaning once a year.
How do you bring birds to your garden?
~Mavis
This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.
Jennifer Jo says
Is that your photo? It’s beautiful!
Carol says
We have a large pine tree in the front yard along with two big maples. In the back there is a maple tree and a few bushes that I planted years ago. I keep two bird feeders filled with a good seed mix year ’round. In the warmer weather I have two humming bird feeders (just started last year and hubby & I are totally hooked!). Summertime is easy to keep fresh water out, but I haven’t found a solar heater for wintertime water containers. Any suggestions would be welcome! We live in Northwest Indiana, btw…
becky says
I love birds. When we lived in the Seattle area, we had these great big bluejays. I often had whole peanuts to throw on the porch to them. They got so trained that they would basically yell on the railing when it was “peanut time”. We also had a quail family that would come for a visit. Here in Ohio I am excited to see cardinals and feeding all the birds when there is snow on the ground.
Random Person Named Melissa says
In my area birds are bad to have in your garden. About a decade or so ago someone released some parrots in the area and they’ve been breeding like crazy. I’m pretty certain once my berry bushes start producing I’ll have to chase the annoying green feather heads out of my hedges. I’m tempted to make a couple domes made out of chickenwire and place them over the bushes just to keep them out.
Cassandra Kuklinski says
How do you know when to clean the birdhouses out? O.o