The best way to get to know your local birds is to have them
come visit you! Birders often spend a lot of time travelling to see birds, but
some of the best experiences are right in your own backyard. In this short
primer, we’ll discuss different strategies for attracting birds with feeders,
water features, and habitat. We’ll also look at some resources for planting
native plants that the birds will enjoy!
FEEDERS
There are lots of different types of feeders, foods, and ways
to arrange them. Let’s start with the feeders. Different feeders will serve
different purposes and hold different types of food. Check out the Project Feederwatch's page for feeder types.
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| From Feederwatch.org |
These different feeders will preferentially hold different
types of food. Having a good variety of foods will ensure that you’ll be able
to attract different types of birds- from Cardinals, Titmice, and Chickadees,
to Downy and Red-bellied Woodpeckers, to Ruby-throated Hummingbirds and
Baltimore Orioles!
Start with some of the following selection of food for your
feeders:
Black Oil Sunflower
Seeds, Thistle/Nyjer, Cracked Corn, Suet, Nectar, Mealworms, Peanuts (whole or
shelled; unsalted), Fruit
Not every food will work in every yard- you’ll just have to
see what your local birds prefer!
FEEDER PLACEMENT:
There has been a great deal of research about the hows and
wheres of feeder placement. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology, National Audubon,
and many others have identified a few guidelines to make feeding birds safe for
them and still enjoyable for us.
1. Feeders near protective cover. Birds out in the
open are vulnerable, and many will shy away from leaving the safety of the
trees and bushes- even if it’s for food. Giving them a staging area in small
shrubs or trees to survey the feeders and watch out for threats is important.
2. Location, location, location. Having feeders in
areas that don’t get a lot of traffic (people, dogs, etc) will go a long way to
having busy feeders. Try to pick a spot that’s quiet, sunny, and provides some
protection. Also be aware of the feeder’s proximity to the house. Birds fleeing
the feeders don’t always look before they fly- especially of there is a
predator near by. Keeping your feeder either close to the house, or further
away, will give the birds enough direction or time to avoid hitting the house.
These impacts with the house- especially windows- are a known factor in bird
mortality.
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| From Cornell Lab of Ornithology |
3. Guard against squirrels and cats: Squirrels and
cats represent two different threats to our birds. Squirrels compete with the
birds for the same food- and can eat a lot! This is more of an annoyance, and
not a terrible threat to the birds’ health. You may want to take some measures
to prevent squirrels from getting on to your feeders- baffles, cages, spinners,
or spicy seeds are just some of the options. There’s more details via Birding.about.com,
ICWMD, and Cornell
[PDF warning].
Outdoor cats, on the other hand, are an active and dangerous
threat to wild birds. It’s known that even well-fed cats still hunt for the fun
of it- and this is an important pressure
on our bird populations. As far as feeders go, make sure that they are
several feet off of the ground and at least 10 feet out from the nearest ambush
spot. There’s more information from the American Bird
Conservancy.
4. Clean your feeders. With all of the traffic and
eating and messing around, birds will eventually make things a little dirty. As
you go to fill your feeders, take a look at them and see if any old food needs
to be removed, there are any unusual things growing in the feeder, and that
everything is in good working order. Feeders can be a source for several
communicable diseases in birds, so it’s important to clean them regularly with
a light bleach solution to get the gunk out.
WATER
Having a water bath in your yard is a great way to attract
birds. They use the water source not only for drinking, but of course bathing
and freshening up. There are nearly as many options for bird baths and bird
water features as there are for feeders! There is a nice solar
powered bird bath set up [PDF warning] from the San Diego Audubon Society,
as well as some other descriptive
set-ups from Audubon’s Yard Map.
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| Summer Tanager at our little water feature |
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| Beautiful landscaped water feature from San Diego Audubon |
NATIVE PLANTS
What we have talked about so far are ways to attract birds
by using things that we build: feeders, water features, etc. And these are
great ways to enjoy our native bird populations and get to see some things we
may normally not notice. But when these birds are not dining on our carefully
prepared seed buffet, where are they? What are they doing? Do they still eat?
The answer is that the birds are completely happy without
us. Them coming to our feeders is just out of convenience. If the native plants
and insects are abundant, then they may not care to come visit our feeders! One
way to both provide native food for the birds- and beautify your yard- is to
plant native plants in your yard.
There are a number of resources to guide you through this-
namely the Lady Bird Johnson
Wildflower Center database. This is an incredible resource that gives you
lots of helpful articles, gives
you some step-by-step guidelines,
and provides a searchable
database to find native plants for your specific region. They even have a Recommended Species List!
To get you started, here in the Brazos Valley we have a
number of excellent native shrubs, trees, vines, and wildflowers to get your
yard off to a great start!
If you're fortunate enough to have acreage (and are tired of
mowing it all!), consider replacing your lawn grass with native bunch
grasses! These can include Little
Bluestem, Broomsedge,
Indiangrass,
or Big
Muhly.
If you want more information, check out the resources from Cornell's YardMap, All About Birds, and Project FeederWatch.
