birdwatch
You’ll have noticed it as well – whenever there’s a very cold snap, or a very wet snap, the birds come flocking to the bird table. No wonder that January is THE moment for nationwide bird counts.
27-29 January – UK and Netherlands
https://www.rspb.org.uk/get-involved/activities/birdwatch/
https://www.vogelbescherming.nl/tuinvogeltelling
28-29 January – Flanders and France
https://www.natuurpunt.be/het-grote-vogelweekend
3-4 February – Brussels and `Wallonia
It’s a great moment to think about feeding birds in the garden - how to attract them, and how to keep them (happy). Breeding season is just around the corner, and by late April/May those birds will be needing way more food to raise their chicks.
Food in feeders
The birds already visiting your garden are, rather obviously, finding at least something that they need.
If you hang up fat balls you most likely see plenty of great tits and blue tits. Robins can just about manage to hang off these balls, but wrens, dunnocks, blackbirds and finches will have to content themselves with collecting fallen scraps.
Robins are keen on all manner of food – worms, seeds, fruits, insects; and wrens prefer spiders and other insects. Sparrows will eat seeds and scraps. You could try strewing a mix of seeds and mealworms for these ground feeders.
Blackbirds eat berries, and fruit as well as insects and worms. Try scattering chopped up apple, as well as the mealworms.
Finches love seeds (and insects in the summer), but are much more likely to be found on the ground under the feeder. Adding a seed feeder of black sunflower seeds vastly increases your chances of seeing finches in your garden.
If you live near even a small woodland of a few hectares, then there is a decent chance that a woodpecker is hanging around somewhere. Woodpeckers will almost certainly come to feed on strings of peanuts and even fat balls, particularly when they are feeding their young (late April/May), and time is of the essence to get enough food back to their nest.
Greater spotted woodpecker feeding on peanuts
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Greater_Spotted_Woodpecker.female._Dendrocopos_major_-_Flickr_-_gailhampshire.jpg
THE NATURAL PANTRY
Many birds change their diets through the year, depending on what is available and what they need. Tits, for example, prefer insects when they are available, and caterpillars are a crucial part of nestlings’ diets. Blue tits even feed directly on aphids.
INSECTS
I will write separately (and rather a lot) about insects in the garden, but here, briefly, are my top tips for promoting a healthy supply of insects in your garden:
Use native plants wherever possible. Insects and plants have co-evolved over thousands of years, so it is no surprise that indigenous plants support the largest insect populations. I’m not just talking about the flying, charismatic pollinators here (1). The phytophagous insects – the suckers of sap, the miners and munchers of leaves - are hugely important in the food chain. They are, logically enough, largely to be found in greater numbers on indigenous plants. Plus your prize roses and esoteric clematis, of course, which you could alternatively view as wildlife pantries.
Leave dead foliage of perennials and grasses, and leaf litter, over winter.
Use climbers liberally, especially where space is at a premium. They can be great sources of both food and shelter.
Leave at least a patch of lawn to grow long, and leave it over the winter too.
FRUIT, SEEDS, BERRIES
My top 10 plants for birds - a selection for smaller gardens . All these plants have multiple wildlife value, being great sources of nectar and pollen during flowering.
1. CRAB APPLE (MALUS SYLVESTRIS)
Blackbirds and thrushes devour the apples in December/January, once they are fully ripe and softening up. Malus ‘Evereste’, for example, never fails to attract them. Hedgehogs – if you are lucky enough to know any – will eat fallen fruit.
2. HAWTHORN (Crataegus monogyna)
One of the most valuable all-round plants for wildlife, it is associated with more than 300 insects, from pollinators to scale insects. And birds such as thrushes, blackbirds and fieldfares will mop up the fruit. Mice too, incidentally.
3. DOG ROSE (Rosa canina)
Another good ‘do-er’ in the wildlife garden, all of who’s parts are of interest to wildlife. From sap-sucking aphids, to moth caterpillars, scale insects to bees. The hips are a delight in the dark days of winter – until the blackbirds and thrushes polish them off. Finches may also seek out the seeds within.
Dog rose (Rosa canina) flower with Thick-legged flower beetle (Oedemera nobilis)
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Fiore_di_Rosa_canina,_Rocca_Romana.jpg
This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
4. Soft fruit
Any soft fruit will bring benefits (as long as you do not use pesticides, obviously). Blackberries have year-round benefits, giving shelter in the winter, flowers that are attractive to myriad insects, including wild, solitary bees, and a relatively late fruiting season. Blackcurrants are a favourite in our family.
5. FIRETHORN (Pyracantha coccinea)
Not only are the berries loved by sparrows, starlings and finches, it’s dense evergreen foliage provides year-round shelter for roosting and nesting birds. Native from Northeastern Spain east as far as Northern Iran.
Note: Although Cotoneaster berries are loved by birds, several species threaten to become invasive in the Low Countries. I would steer clear of them, other than in the most urban of settings.
6. IVY (Hedera helix)
I waxed lyrical about ivy in my last post. Blackcaps, thrushes, blackbirds and wood pigeons all feast on the berries.
7. HONEYSUCKLE (Lonicera periclymenum)
This is another wonderful climber, attracting moths in the summer. Robins and blackbirds enjoy the autumn berries.
8. TEASEL (Dipsacus fullonum)
A perennial with beautifully architectural seedheads in the winter, much loved by goldfinches.
Goldfinches on teasel
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Juvenile_Goldfinches_on_Teasels_-_Aberthaw_lagoon_-_geograph.org.uk_-_2063028.jpg
9. EVENING PRIMROSE (Oenothera biennis)
The flowers are magnets for moths on summer nights, and the seed heads provide food for finches in the winter. Strong silhouettes give structure your winter garden.
10. GRASS
If you have a lawn, let wildflowers grow in it, leave a part of it to grow long during the summer, and even leave a patch long in the winter. Dandelions are one of nature’s wonder plants. The grass and flowers will support many invertebrates.