Birds of a feather...

I like to see all kinds of birds in the yard. From those teeny yellow finches, squabbling over the Niger thistle seeds, to the handsome chickadee and the flying jewels that are the hummers.

Of all the birds you can invite in, hummingbirds are probably the easiest and least messy to have in your yard as a guest. The best time to get started is RIGHT NOW – early spring – when they are starting to return from migration and looking for the best places to build their nests.

When you bring out your feeders to wash them and fill them, give them plenty of time for the hummers to find them. I’ve been told it could take a month or more. I, personally, have not had that experience. Hummers seem to come looking for them. If you have one that’s busy and you add another, the numbers seem to exponentially increase and pretty soon, you got hoards of the little beggars. However many feeders you put up, make sure that you keep your feeding solution fresh.

When you’re choosing a feeder, be sure to choose one with some red color on it. Most of them do anyway. We got a feeder kit recently that uses a one liter soda bottle for the solution tank. Kind of cool, a great way to recycle a pop bottle and the kit was reasonably priced.

Fill your feeder with either a commercially prepared feeder solution or a solution with a ratio of 1:4 of sugar and water. Boil the solution to rid it of any potential bacteria, fungus or mold. Let it cool before filling your feeder. I hate to shriek this out in all capital letters, but here goes: DO NOT USE HONEY OR ARTIFICIAL SWEETENERS IN YOUR HUMMINGBIRD FEEDERS. These are both harmful to hummingbirds. Make a gallon at a time and keep it in an empty milk jug in the refrigerator (recycle recycle recycle) so you can easily keep your feeders filled. You can store it for up to a week and, in summer, you’re going to use at least that much. Skip the red food coloring. Your feeder probably has enough red on it to attract the hummers and that red chemical is likely not all that great for the birds.

I can’t say this enough – keep the solution in the feeders FRESH. In cooler weather, change it out and wash your feeder once a week, even if it’s not empty. When it gets warmer – say mid-June or so – two or three times a week. Mold and fungus grows pretty easily and it’s hazardous to hummers.

Male hummers are very territorial towards their feeders and spend lots of time chasing interlopers. While it’s entertaining to watch, it’s really better to simply reduce the competition by hanging out several feeders throughout your yard. I generally keep feeders for the hummers away from feeders for the other birds.

There are many types of plants you can offer in your garden that have a dual purpose of being gorgeous and attracting hummers, honey bees and butterflies. Good choices for our area are: Honeysuckle, sage or salvia, columbine, bee balm, comfrey, foxglove, delphinium, red hot poker, coral bells, dianthus, nicotiana, lupine, petunias, impatiens, fuscias, morning glories and trumpet vines.

For the other types of feathered friends, there are some really easy things you can do that will attract more birds to your yard.

Of course, the first thing is feeders. Mesh bags full of Niger thistle seeds will bring in the finches, chickadees and a host of other tiny birds. Feeders containing the more traditional seed offerings will bring along everyone else. We had a suet plug feeder that was quite entertaining with the flickers, woodpeckers and Stellar jays duking it out for a snack.

The basket style of suet feeder actually can serve a dual purpose. Once you’re done feeding suet and nest building time arrives, you can fill it with cotton cushion stuffing, dog hair from grooming your dog, sheep’s wool, llama down, snips of yarn and such. Hummers, in particular, seem attracted to the cotton down cushion stuffing.

If you have the room on your property to have one, a brush pile will be used by birds to get out of the harsher elements. Take fallen and pruned branches from trees and shrubs on your property and loosely stack them in an area where they won’t bug your neighbors or be an eyesore. Try to make your pile about 6’ x 6’. It should be airy and have lots of open spaces for the birds to flit in and out. A brush pile will provide food in that there will be insects among the decaying branches or on the ground beneath the pile. Brush piles seem to be used the most during the winter and earlier spring months. You can burn it, if you wish, toward the end of the burn season. Don’t forget your permit.

Planting a hedgerow – a long line of shrubs and small trees at the border of a field or lawn. Birds will use hedgerows in all seasons because they provide food, shelter and nesting sites.

Leave the leaves. Fallen leaves provide nutrients to your soil as they break down. They provide an insulation layer over the soil that keeps it warmer and moister. Insects and other microbial soil denizens live under these conditions. There are many garden birds that love to feed in leaf litter, including thrushes, robins and sparrows.

Providing a dust bath area will allow many birds a way to rid themselves of mites and other parasites and to fluff their feathers to keep them in top condition. Choose a sunny area about three feet square in the vicinity of your seed feeders. Clear it of vegetation, hollow it out two to three inches. If you can, get some fine dust or that super fine sand you find in the river bed. With the river much lower these days, access to the sandy spots should be more available. You can always mix sand with topsoil as well. Rim your dust bath with rocks and natural timber to make it more attractive. Be sure to keep an eye on any cats wandering about. Birds won’t use the dust bath it the cats have been using it.

I’d like to leave you with some suggestions for shrubs and perennials that would be great for drawing our feathered friends to your yard. Of course, the annual Sunflowers are perfect and make me happy just to have them around.

Shrubs: Holly, pyracantha, lilac, Oregon grape, sumac, barberry, raspberry, hackberry, elderberry, gooseberry. If you have them, and the means to take care of them, those “pesky” blackberry brambles, trimming them up, watering them and providing some decent fertilizer will not only give you some superior fruit, but really provide some great habitat for the birds.

Perennials: Coreopsis, bleeding heart, penstemons, phlox, globe thistle or even artichokes, goldenrod and just about any of the large family of ornamental grasses.

They say variety is the spice of life. It’s also the key to encouraging birds of all kinds to hang out in your yard. Providing a mixture of trees, clumps of berry bearing shrubs, fruit trees and a variety of flowers and grasses, weeds allowed to go to seed, a wildflower patch, insects to forage, a well stocked feeder and maybe even a water feature, like a fountain or birdbath will please a great variety of feathered visitors.