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Index : Landscaping Design
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- 16. Creating A Desert Bird Garden - Top
- With the popularity of birding here in Arizona, it's little wonder that their is so much interest in desert bird gardening. Actually it's gardening for birds; providing their essentials needs of food, water, and shelter in the confines of home garden.
As with any landscape, gardens designed to attract birds can be very attractive. Variety of plant material is very important. Various sizes and shapes of plants is key in providing habitat adapted to the many bird species that frequent Arizona.
Patches of plantings don't have to be large, but they should provide a natural transition from open areas to more denser thickets of growth. Low, sprawling ground cover plants can be used at the edge of the planting. Moving back from the ground covers can be small, medium and large shrubs. Finally, small and medium sized trees provide a canopy effect that is inviting to birds. Remember, birds prefer twiggy, untrimmed plants to hide and nest in. Shearing shrubs will eliminate natural perching and nesting areas.
Birds prefer natural surroundings. This means allowing some litter and weeds in the garden and landscape. If an area is too well manicured, with all weeds pulled, leaves blown or raked away, and plants sheared, birds are not likely to come. If limbs drop from trees, let them lay. Birds find tasty insect morsels in decaying wood and vegetation.
Densely branched plants with thorns provide ideal protection from natural predators. Plants possessing these qualities include; acacia, ironwood, desert hackberry, cholla, gray thorn, and pyracantha. Other plants providing natural shelter include; velvet mesquite, blue palo verde, desert willow, wolfberry and thornbush.
Plants should also be selected that provide birds a varied diet of seeds, berries, and in the case of hummingbirds, nectar. The desert is rich in fruit and seed bearing plants. Prickly pair, cholla, barrel cacti, and saguaro to name a few. Others abundant food producers that can be incorporated into the home landscape include; deergrass, fairy duster, black dalea, pyracantha, and brittle bush. For hummingbirds, include nectar producing plants such as chuparosa, penstemon, autumn sage, desert honeysuckle, Mexican and yellow bird of paradise, and hummingbird trumpet bush.
As you would imagine, water is a limiting factor for birds in the desert. Lots of people put out bird baths, but stagnating water can lead to the development of bird diseases. Fountains with running water are better for birds. But even a small amount of water moving through a bird bath will prevent water stagnation. Drip tubing can be used to supply fresh water to the bowl. Battery operated irrigation time clocks attached to an outdoor faucet can be set to automatically turn water on through the drip tubing. It doesn't need to run constantly, just a time or two a day will be enough. Battery operated irrigation clocks are available at most garden supply and hardware stores.
Whenever possible, avoid the use of chemical pesticides in your bird garden. Pesticides that find their way into the water or on seeds or fruits can be ingested directly by birds. Indirectly, pesticides will limit the insect food sources for birds visiting your garden.
For more information on attracting birds to your landscape, an excellent booklet entitled "Desert Bird Gardening" is available from the Arizona Native Plant Society. The booklet has 66 color photos of plants and birds; growing information for 45 desert adapted plant species and descriptions of 24 species of birds commonly seen in Southwest gardens. Desert Bird Gardening is available for $2.00 per copy from ANPS, P.O. Box 41206, Sun Station, Tucson, AZ. 85717.
The topic for this week's garden demonstration will be Growing Your Own Grape Vines. It will be presented on Wednesday at 9:00 a.m. at the Pima County Extension Center, at 1:00 p.m. at the Wilmot Library, and on Thursday at 1:00 p.m. at Marana Planning Services on the Northeast corner of Orange Grove and Thornydale. Answers to gardening questions may be obtained by phoning 626-5161 in Tucson or 648-0808 in Green Valley.
- Updated: April 23, 2001
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