Gardening for Birds in Canada
all about my Backyard Birds in Canada:
pictures of my backyard birds in Canada
DIY Birdhouses - for various size birds @ craftpals.com
How to make a bird friendly habitat?
You need to provide birds with four basic requirements for a bird friendly habitat.
Birds need food, water, cover and a safe place to raise their young.
Diversity is the key of making a bird friendly habitat.
Offer a variety of seed in bird feeders and position the bird feeder at different levels around the yard to cater to different species of birds.
Whenever you have spilt seeds on the ground, you will also have unwanted Critters around your feeders besides the birds that are ground feeders like; Mourning Doves, Juncos, Cardinals, Starlings, Black Birds and more.
So far I have seen three couples using the free accommodations to raise their young in our yard.
One Black-capped Chickadees and two House Wrens. It's always a proud moment to watch healthy fledglings take their first flight, but also sad to see them go.
There's always next year. The sheets have been changed, the room dusted and the door is open. :)
Last year I replaced the Black-capped Chickadee's birdhouse with a new one. Nope, they wouldn't use it. They found the old birdhouse and moved in there. "old home, sweet home, is best." :)
Food and Feeding Birds:
When it comes to feeding birds and best birdfeeders I like platform feeders.
Tube feeders are great, but some fussy birds just flick their unwanted seeds everywhere.
I also like suet and peanut feeders.
I made my own suet and peanut feeders, with leftover wood from the workshop and 1/4" hardware cloth.
Woodpeckers love it and recently so does the Starlings.
Best Birdseed:
I like black oil sunflower seeds. Sometimes for variety I feed my birds mixed birdseed, but most of it ends up on the ground for the mice, squirrels and rabbits to eat. So, now I feed them, sunflower seeds, peanuts, safflower and suet with a mixture of different seeds.
Hummingbird Feed and Feeder:
Best Plants, Shrubs and Trees for Birds:
Birds are encouraged pest predators in anyone's yard.
They will eat enormous amounts of insects and insect eggs.
The best way to attract birds to the yard is by providing the essentials like, birdhouses,
birdfeeders and bird baths.
If you feed birds during the winter months, the sight of birds happily eating away the free food, it's always a nice welcome surprise.
The best plants and trees that I found for attracting birds are:
Trees with berries or fruits like, ornamental cherry trees, cherry trees, apples, crab apples, cedar trees, maple, white birch seeds and holly.
Bushes and Vines are: berries, currants, grapes, holly bushes, cosmos seeds and sunflowers. If they find any fresh seeds or fruits in your yard that they like they will eat everything until there's nothing left. I thought they would leave me some.
Landscaping for bird baths:
I like to keep my bird baths right in the open so birds have a clear view of their surroundings, but close to cover for a quick escape.
I don't have a cat, but we have hawks and neighbours' cats.
For bird baths at the moment, I just have clay plant saucers and a serving metal tray for a birdbath.
The serving tray is my favourite. It's two inches deep and shinning metal. Easy to clean.
I have had others like, concrete birdbath - it was heavy, hard to keep clean and not winter hardy.
I like the large clay saucer, but it was hard to keep clean.
Heated bird baths, only lasted one season. Not doing that anymore, so my birds are doing just fine eating snow and going down to the lake.
Gardening for Butterflies
Backyard Birds in Canada ||
Landscaping for Hummingbirds
||
Bird Spring Cleaning & Maintenance
Birds
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Canadian Gardening
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