How hard is it to design and create a woodland garden?

Ideas and tips to bring backyard landscape ideas to life

It’s not easy being a woodland gardener.

I mean, how long can you sit and watch the chipmunks playing on the rocks or the birds feeding their young from the nearby birch branch. And those pesky hummingbirds buzzing around feeding from the cardinal flowers, not to mention the feeders hanging on the pole beside you.

Eventually you’ll need a break from not having to cut grass, deadhead the flowers and prune the shrubs to within an inch of their life.

So how hard is it to create a woodland garden? It’s important to know that a woodland garden design is most likely the easiest of all gardens to maintain providing you’re willing to relax a little. It’s the ultimate low-maintenance backyard landscape, but it will require some work to get it established at the front end. Plant trees, shrubs and get a ground cover established and then relax and learn to work with nature rather than against it.

It’s not all fun and games.

Add the burden of trying to satisfy our friendly chipmunk after she returns for what seems like her 100th visit to load up on peanuts.

Over in the corner of the garden, a doe rests in the tall ferns, while her two fawns romp around waiting for their day to begin.

Like I say, “this ain’t easy.”

And the noise! The birds, the bees, it’s all so overwhelming.

Nap time can’t come soon enough around here.

If this sounds good to you, it may be time to reconsider your backyard landscape design and use the information contained here on this website for backyard ideas and tips to create your low-maintenance landscape.

If you are looking for assistance, consider picking up The American Woodland Garden, by acclaimed author Rick Darke, Capturing the Spirit of the Deciduous Forest. It can be difficult to find, but is often available on the used market. Alibris, an U.S.-based used book seller, has copies of The American Woodland Garden for approximately $25 if readers are interested.

“So how hard is it to create a woodland garden? It’s important to know that a woodland garden design is most likely the easiest of all gardens to maintain providing you’re willing to relax a little. It’s the ultimate low-maintenance backyard landscape, but it will require some work to get it established at the front end. Plant trees, shrubs and get a ground cover established and then relax and learn to work with nature rather than against it. ”

— Ferns & Feathers Author

If you are interested in exploring the world of shade gardening further, you might like my recent post on The Natural Shade garden.

A play of light catches on the fern fronds in our woodland garden where deer often hide their young for the day. The changing light is just one of the pleasures of creating a natural garden and capturing it with a camera.

Let the leaves fall to the ground and just leave them there over the winter.

The decaying leaves are important places for insects and pupae to overwinter. Their decomposition helps to build an earthy, humus-rich soil alive with micro-organisms.

Birds depend on the insects come spring to feed their nestlings. (Check out this post for the complete story on leaving your leaves where they fall.) (Check out this post on how to use fallen leaves to build your Woodland soil.)

The ultimate woodland wildlife garden incorporates layering. This illustration shows what birds primarily use the various zones.

Relaxing is key to building a woodland garden design

To build a Woodland garden, it’s important to be willing to let nature do its thing and not worry about every little weed (let’s just call it a wild flower shall we).

Instead of spending our days weeding, let’s, instead, ensure our Woodlands are filled with a variety of ground covers that stop weeds from taking over the garden beds.

Try a little Snow-in-Summer in a hot dry area to cover the ground with a living mulch. Not only is Snow-in-Summer a beautiful ground cover, it offers outstanding opportunities for some beautiful selective-focus photography.

If you do it right, you’ll have plenty of time to photograph the daily life of your garden and its visitors.

A friendly peanuts joins me for a little lunch. Creating a natural woodland wildlife garden is full of little surprises.

Where living ground covers are inappropriate, let’s use organic mulch like shredded bark, pine needles or composted leaves to cover the soil and restrict any weeds that want to poke up through the soil.

Instead of pulling weeds all summer, let’s relax with a glass wine on the patio and enjoy our feathered friends. Let’s use that time to focus on planting more native plants to attract more insects to our yards that, in turn, will bring more birds to our woodland gardens.

And those hostas that were eaten by our family of deer, let’s just rejoice in the fact we are keeping the local wildlife happy and healthy. (Click here for a gallery of the wildlife that visit our Woodland garden.)

If you can live with that, welcome to my woodland garden blog. It’s aptly named Ferns & Feathers for its abundance of both ferns and feathered friends.

If you care to join me, we’ll tackle this thing together; learn from one another’s shared knowledge and experiences. We can take some time to enjoy a discussion or two about building the woodland garden one tree at a time through layering – from the forest floor to the tips of the tallest trees.

Along the way we’ll share our top 3… top 5… top 10. (Click here for my five favourite bird items or here for my top 5 woodland garden books.

We’ll share what products work best for us, (like this Gorilla Cart or a blue tooth speaker) some time-saving tips, work-saving tips.

I’ll also be sharing garden photography tips, tricks and ideas to bring out the best images hiding in your garden. Doesn’t matter if your best camera is an i-phone, a sweet little point-and-shoot enthusiast camera model or a full-featured digital 35mm camera. I use them all to document our garden and, with a little luck, can pass on some wisdom from a hobby I’ve been enjoying most of my life.

Mornings are a great time to be out in the garden.

And I’ve got some time after recently retiring from almost 40 years in the newspaper business. So, with all this time on my hands, my wife told me to find something to fill it with or else… I decided to combine two of my great loves – gardening and photography – into a fun little spot on the web for like-minded gardeners to pull up an adirondack chair and join me and Holly (our four-legged friend) to share some tall tales, our victories, failures and a decent glass of wine.

Okay, let’s get this show on the road.

Best ground covers for a backyard woodland design

Three of the best ground covers for the shade garden

I once had a friend promise me some pink trilliums from her parents’ garden.

I knew back then that white trilliums turn pink as they pass their prime and begin going into decline.

You may ask, ‘what does this have to do with ground covers’?

Using native sea oat grasses like these can be an effective groundcover in your garden.

Let’s just say promises of great things are not always what they appear to be, especially when it comes groundcovers.

So the promise of rare pink trillium plants was enticing, but not really what it appeared to be.

In the end, I took the pink trilliums knowing that next spring they would emerge as glorious white trilliums in our landscape eventually turning pink before disappearing again.

So what are the best ground covers?

The best ground covers are the ones that deliver what you need in a specific area of your garden.

Proper research will help guide you to the best plant to achieve the desired effect, rather than an-out-of-control planting that quickly takes over the entire garden.

Consider native plants whenever possible.

Ferns are ideal for shady places and sweet woodruff is always an ideal woodland addition.

Although not native, pachysandra can be an all-around proven winner in most gardens.

Gardeners know, however, that promises can be good or bad depending on how you perceive them. The very nature of a quick-spreading plant makes it a potential problem. Traditional groundcovers spread fast and are considered by many to have aggressive tendencies in our low-maintenance landscapes.

Making the right decision can be the difference in reducing the amount of work and adding to your burden in a big way.

Trying to pull out a huge mass of rapidly expanding, deep-rooted groundcover plants is no fun at all.

Looking for more information on ground covers? Please check out my other posts on ground covers I use in the woodland garden.

• Bunchberry ideal ground cover

• What is the easiest ground cover to grow?

• Creeping thyme as a ground cover

• Moss and moss-like ground covers

• Virginia Creeper as a vine or ground cover

Backyard tips for using ground covers in your landscape

Word of warning, don’t make a mistake here and choose the wrong plant to use as your ground cover.

Many years back, I read a book about the value of using ground covers in your garden design. One of the most important lessons learned from it was to plant several different ground covers and let them compete with one another for supremacy.

It’s a lesson in landscape designs I have followed to this day. The results depend on several factors, including soil type and location.

In most cases, however, there is no clear winner. The ground covers live together in harmony battling for superiority and weaving a tapestry of texture and colour that gives variety to the garden and an informality that seems at home in the woodland or shade garden.

Here are three of my favourite ground covers for our woodland landscape design… there are more, lots more.

This highly informative poster created by Justin Lewis is best viewed on a tablet or desktop.

Ferns are perfect for the woodland garden

Coming in as number one in my garden because they are so darn perfect for a woodland garden is the humble fern. Although the massive, and some would say aggressive ostrich fern (link to proven winners website), dominates most of my gardens in both the front and the back, there are other ferns that make their home here too.

Want more information on creating a fern garden, check out my full post here.

Our ostrich ferns could not be more at home here. They dominate a large “wild” area in a corner of the garden once covered in a work-intensive lawn (link to earlier post about eliminating grass) that I am not sad to see go. Now, the ferns that can grow three-feet tall and spread out three to four feet wide, blanket the ground beneath in a lovely shade and provide perfect habitat for many of our wild critters.

In fact, It’s not uncommon to see a doe park her fawns on the edge of the ferns where they can hide in safety all day. A fox has been known to poke its head out from the thicket of ferns and reptiles, chipmunks and birds are often seen emerging from the fern glen.

In fall, the ferns turn a lovely shade of beige and become the landing zone for many of my leaves from the front garden. All winter, they serve as the ideal location for birds to root around for over wintering insects. I’ve seen wild turkeys working their way through the dead ferns snacking on a host of insects, seeds and berries.

I use ferns as a ground cover but grow several under story plants and small trees up through the ferns.

In keeping with the woodland layering approach, understorey trees (my earlier post on building a woodlandand) shrubs grow up through the ferns. Several Redbuds (single and multi-trunk), a multi-trunk serviceberry, two azaleas and several dogwoods (both Cornus Florida and Kousa) as well as a variegated Curnus Mas are just a few of the understory trees that are at home among the ferns.

Other ferns in the garden include:

• The Japanese-painted fern with its silvery fronds hi-lighted by red stalks is simply an outstanding performer in shaded areas where it can really put on a show. It’s not aggressive at all in my garden, but I can split them to add to their numbers if I want to have more and more. And believe me I do. Mine are in the front garden near a bird bath where they are happy in deep shade and are watered regularly when I top up the bird bath. These ferns perform best when they are kept moist.

• The Ghost fern. I have only one located in our Japanese-inspired part of the garden, but it can be a show stopper. Larger than the painted fern but apparently a relative. Its soft, very light green colour gives it an almost luminescent appearance in shade, which is where it likely gets its name.

• Maidenhair ferns are my absolute favourites. Their delicate fronds and black wirey stalks make these a must-have in any woodland. Although they can be difficult to grow, given the right conditions in a woodland garden, they will thrive. They are perfect in a Japanese-inspired garden. It’s important to note that they need plenty of shade and water. I have mine right up next to some granite boulders where their delicate fronds juxtapose with the heavy texture of the moss-covered rocks. They are also close to a birdbath that reminds me to keep them well-watered.

There are more we’ll get to but that’s a good start.

Any of the native groundcovers listed in the image above, are better than the following non-native groundcovers listed below. If you can use native groundcovers and they work in your area, always choose native over non-native.

In saying that, the following two groundcovers could work in your area as well.

Sweet Woodruff ideal for dry shade garden

The delicate, whorled foliage of Sweet Woodruff together with its early-spring white flowers make this a great ground cover for the woodland garden. It is not native and some would consider it aggressive, but it is not aggressive in my area and in the conditions where I grow it. I have mine under a Crimson Maple competing for space with trilliums, Ostrich ferns and hostas. It spreads nicely but I would not call it aggressive.

Pachysandra is strong performer any landscape design

So this one can be a little aggressive and certainly not a native to Canada and the United States. It’s best not to let it go unchecked by solid barriers.

It’s aggressive nature can be good or bad depending where you are putting it and how you want to use it. It’s pretty common, but it provides a 3- to 4-inch-high ground cover that can take some sun, has delicate white flowers in the spring and can cover ground fast and efficiently. Make sure you have a boundary so it and you know where its limits are. I use it in my front garden where it forms the main ground cover replacing grass that once covered our front lawn. Although many gardeners use it as a sole ground cover under evergreens or other large trees, I like to grow larger woodland plants up through the pachysandra, including hostas, native columbine, ferns, (including Japanese painted and maidenhair), Jack in the pulpits, solomon’s seal, epimedium, grasses and sedges.

Pocket forests: A growing idea finds a home in urban settings

Akira Miyawaki is original creator of mini forest

Why plant a tree when you can plant a miyawaki forest?

It’s a concept that I have always thought made a lot of sense and there is actually a movement taking root, especially in parts of Europe and North America, that encourages planting an intensive mini forest.

This process of creating a small, native forest in a fraction of the time it would normally take in nature, goes by several names: including “micro forest” or “Miyawaki Forest.” In Ireland, a group of young women are even creating a business focusing on what they call a “Pocket Forest.” (But more on their efforts later in the article.)

The mini forest has its roots in the 1970s with the work of a Japanese botanist named Dr. Akira Miyawaki, hence the original name “Miyawaki Forest.” It’s a method he perfected and one that has since been adopted by a number of people looking for a way to recreate a natural forest in a very short period of time – primarily with the aim of restoring native flora and fauna as well as sequestering carbon in an attempt to save the environment from global warming.

Since Dr. Miyawaki discovered the benefits of this method it is estimated that more than 40 million trees have been planted using the Miyawaki Method.

If you are interested in exploring the world of shade gardening further, you might like my recent post on The Natural Shade garden.

Pocket Forests are becoming an important factor in helping rejuvenate nature in Dublin, Ireland.

So what is the Miyawaki method?

It is a scientifically proven method of growing a very small (in some cases tiny) urban forest of native trees and plants in the span of 20 to 30 years – a process that normally would take 200-300 years if left to nature.

A traditional forest grows in three stages: primary, secondary and finally the climax stage. The Miyawaki method skips the first two stages and moves directly to planting a very intensive climax-stage forest and climax community that is planted so dense that the trees, (a variety of native trees and shrubs) skyrocket up competing with one another for light. The result is a miniature, well-balanced ecosystem that works together above and below ground to create the miniature forest. The fact that everything is native, means that the miniature forest is able to maintain balance, is tolerant of the conditions and attracts a myriad of native plant and animal life. A study even showed that one forest attracted 600 species of plants and animals.

Miyawaki mini forest compared to commercially grown plantation

You may say that we have been growing forests for years, replanting forested areas that have been harvested for old growth trees, so why would this method be any different?

Here are some interesting comparisons between the growth of a commercially-grown plantation and a pocket forest.

The trees grow ten times faster in the pocket forest and are 30 times more dense than the trees in a commercial plantation.

Studies have also shown that the pocket forest boasts 100 times more biodiversity and is 100 times more organic than the commercially grown plantation.

Conventional forest compared to mini forests

If that’s not enough, compared to a conventional forest, the pocket forest boasts 30 times or more carbon-dioxide absorption.

If planted properly, it has a guaranteed growth of at least one meter per year and after the initial few years is completely maintenance free.

In as few as three years you have the beginning of a native forest that is completely chemical and fertilizer free with little to no maintenance after two years.

Catherine Cleary and business partner Ashe Conrad-Jones ready for another day of creating Pocket Forests.

How small can the forests be?

These forests can be incredibly small. In fact, in urban centres it is not uncommon to create a forest the size of a typical parking spot at a mall parking lot. One forest was created inside a large, steel, garbage container in an urban/industrialized area.

“We can fit our smallest one into 6 square metres. That’s about the size of a single car parking space. So they can go lots of places… In that small space we plant 11 different species,” explains Catherine Cleary, a co-owner of Pocket Forests in Dublin Ireland.

Catherine, a journalist who was writing about food and reviewing restaurants when Covid hit in February 2020 and her business partner Ashe Conrad-Jones, who runs a small events design business, decided to team up in 2020 and create “pocket forests” based on the Miyawaki method.

“Together we decided that the shutting down of restaurants and events was an opportunity to explore an idea we thought would be perfect for our area of Dublin – a part of Ireland that has the least amount of green space per person in the country. We contacted Afforest in India and IVN in the Netherlands about the Tiny Forests they were planting in urban areas and set up our social enterprise in the summer of 2020 to bring the idea to Irish towns and cities,” explains Cleary.

“No one will protect what they don’t care about; and no one will care about what they have never experienced.”

— David Attenborough

A Pocket Forest beginning to put on growth. Notice how closely the trees are planted together.

It hasn’t been easy but the team has now grown to three with Amy joining Catherine and Ashe in January 2022. She had been working with another local social enterprise, the Dublin Food Co-Op for a decade and wanted to make a change.

How many Pocket forests have been planted?

It’s still early, but Clearly says the company has planted nearly 50 pocket forests since they started, ranging in size from six square metres to 100 square metres.

“We have faced lots of challenges, launching a business while trying to maintain our other “jobs/gigs,” explains Cleary in an email to Ferns & Feathers.

“We had to learn a lot about how to do this. It is not a conventional form of forestry or horticulture but a space all of its own,” explains Cleary. “We have struggled, until very recently, to find native plants grown organically but that is improving and in our first season we had to find temporary homes for hundreds of trees so we could use them in the next bare-root season. (We built a raised bed in my front garden and borrowed a patch of land from a cousin.)”

Part of the companys challenges is convincing local authorities that native trees and shrubs actually belong in the urban areas.

“There is a growing movement to move toward hardier, drought-tolerant, non-native trees that the horticulture industry claims will cope with climate changes and the hostility of city conditions, Cleary explains. “We argue that we should change those conditions by planting pocket forests rather than lone trees as they are incredibly resilient ecosystems, help reverse biodiversity loss and maintain our connections with native trees and shrubs.”

Their arguments get a lot of support from Peter Wohlleben, author of the 288-page, New York Times best seller The Hidden Life of Trees. In his writings, Wohlleben focusses on the importance of a community of trees working together rather than a single tree in an urban environment all on its own. He compares these lone urban trees with “street kids” trying to survive in harsh conditions on their own. These trees have a much shorter lifespan, do not grow as large and are in a daily battle for food, water and a source of healthy soil amidst the concrete of big city life.

How important is soil to Pocket Forests?

Soil, Cleary admits, is vital for the success of a Pocket forest.

“Increasingly we are fascinated by soil health and involving people who live or work or go to the school near the forests in making them so that they can become forest keepers and get all the benefits of those connections with the natural world,” Cleary explains.

“That is our mission: reconnecting people with the natural world, regenerating soil and THEN planting trees, in that order,” Cleary explains

“We love the first forest we worked on, in the grounds of a local school. It is still our largest forest and it is breathtaking to see how the plants are thriving. It is teeming with life both above and below ground and it is just in its second growing season. My own pocket forest in my garden gives me joy every day. I look closely at everything that's happening in it from day to day and season to season and it feels like a vital part of my day to do that.”

Presently, the Pocket Forest team, is working with five schools to plant larger forests this season and are just beginning to prepare the soil this month with two of them.

But their work is constantly growing and sometimes takes them into unusual places.

“We have established a small nursery in an open prison about an hour from the city and will be holding a workshop on their family day to talk to people about the trees, our obsession with worms and soil. We carry out compost workshops in our partner The Digital Hub, a local Government campus where tech start ups and other small companies are based. We are hoping to plant a balcony forest outside a neonatal unit in our local Children's Hospital.”

Currently, the women don’t work outside Ireland, but have done a cross-border project in Newry in Northern Ireland.

Super fertile soil plays a vital role in the success of the Pocket Forest.

Pocket Forest team Q&A

Ferns & Feathers sent Catherine and the Pocket Forest group a series of questions about their work, including how their system might benefit existing woodland gardeners or, if there Pocket Forests could be used for a typical new home here in North America. The following are their highly informative and inspirational answers to the questions.

1) Why did you get involved in creating these forests and do you feel they are an important factor in dealing with climate change into the future.

Cleary: “It was a very personal decision about using my time in the climate and biodiversity crises to try to help alleviate problems.

There’s a quote from David Attenborough that we kept returning to in early presentations: “No one will protect what they don't care about; and no one will care about what they have never experienced.”

“Native Irish forests account for less than 2 per cent of our land habitats and many of them are inaccessible to people, growing in remote areas. Putting a version of them into places where most people live (towns and cities) links up the more wide-scale reforestation project that is going to be vital in the years ahead. We learned very quickly how positively everyone responds to the work of putting spades or forks in the ground, mulching soil with healthy compost, worms, leaf mulch and woody material to begin to try to create the conditions naturally found on a healthy forest floor. We've learned so much from the new science revealing the collaborations between plants and soil life to create thriving ecosystems. Healthy forests can be a huge help in sequestering carbon but we don't see pocket forests as a carbon-offset idea. We need to stop emitting carbon, protect existing forests and create new ones. We need to restore the reverence that Irish people used to have towards trees, the sense that the natural world is more powerfully in control of the system than we are and our efforts to impose our ideas of what looks good or extract resources without protecting the soil life all have to change. Forests are the healthiest systems and have so much to teach us about what it is that the land longs for, and how putting “forest-thinking” into how we produce food or plan cities or teach children about the world will only make things better.”

2) What are the responses of your clients 1-2-3 years down the road as the forests thicken?

Cleary: “Some of them wonder about the wildness of what they have - aphids regularly attack some plants and we've had some clients wonder about them. We give them an information booklet and for people with restricted space there are pruning instructions to keep the trees from growing to their full size. In bigger sites we are advising people to let the trees do their thing, and so far they are.”

3) Are there lessons that can be learned from Pocket forests that can be used in regular forests and woodlands to move them along more quickly or are the steps so precise that they do not translate well to traditional woodlots or forests?

Cleary: “The healthiest forest creation is done by forests. Given the chance (fencing land from grazing or mowing or spraying) a field surrounded by a native hedgerow will become a forest as the trees and shrubs seed themselves. Some management may be needed to keep invasive species out but that is really all anyone needs to do. So we take all our lessons from that. Soil management could be better done than it is at the moment in mainstream forest-creation. Foresters are still using herbicides to spray off competing vegetation after they plant young trees. This is counterproductive and we would definitely love to see mainstream forestry taking a more regenerative approach. We still clear-fell tree plantations for timber and that has to change. Continuous cover forestry is far more sustainable and ancient practices like coppicing could be rediscovered using pocket forests in schools as they grow and become established.”

The team behind Pocket Forests preparing to install yet another of their hard-working miniature forests.

4) How important is it to use native trees and plants in the creation of the Pocket Forests.

Cleary: “It's very important that the core of a pocket forest is native trees and shrubs. We don't mind if people also want to add in fruit trees and shrubs and add flowering plants to the edges of a pocket forest but the majority of it must be native.”

5) Is there anything homeowners who have their own woodland/wildlife gardens can take away from the success of the Pocket Forests?

Cleary: “Spend time enjoying your woodland or wildlife garden, see how its circular system - cycling leaf fall and branches into soil, creates a maintenance free ecosystem. It doesn't need watering, weeding or feeding. Then apply that forest thinking in your vegetable garden or flower beds. Mulch, don't dig, allow what arrives in your garden to take its space before you try to carve out all the space for your idea of what it should be.”

6) For new homeowners looking to create a woodland garden in their typical suburban backyards, would a Pocket Forest work, or would it be too intensive to be successful in a typical urban garden…?

Cleary: “We choose species that can be pruned to stay small in my very small back garden - it is a version of a forest, almost a specimen forest, a form of large-scale bonsai where the closeness of the roots and some gentle pruning in winter keeps the trees from growing to their full size. This can prolong the life of a tree ( a laid hedge can grow for 1,000 years) and also gives garden birds, soil life and insects so much habitat.”

7) Cleary: “What other words of advice might you give to those wanting more information on establishing a Pocket Forest whether it’s in their own backyard or schoolyard…”

8) Cleary: “Can the same approach be used to create a food forest that might be useful to help feed families in need etc.?

Cleary: “Community food forests have wonderful potential to reconnect families with where food comes from. Unlike an allotment where much time and skill is needed with the right planting a food forest can do much of the hard work itself and people can interact with it for enjoyment rather than the constant battling against weeds that happens in bare-soil allotment gardening. A food forest would take time to establish and it would be a stretch to say they could solve food poverty. But fruit and nuts from a food forest will be higher in nutrients and vegetable growing can be incorporated into food forests. The abundance of a food forest also lends itself to community kitchen operations where fruit or vegetable gluts can be cooked or preserved and shared.”

9) You have put in Pocket Forests in schools. What are the children’s reaction to the almost instant forests you have helped them create.?

Cleary: “They love the forests but they also love the work of creating them. Many of the children we work with have no gardens, not even balcony space to grow things and get their hands in the soil and have contact with its health benefits. One girl talked about her trees being her legacy to the school. That made us very happy (and tearful). The children who need it the most are the ones that we see blossoming when we go in to work on a pocket forest project. We would love to grow the enterprise to be able to offer training and jobs to these young people, to train an army of pocket foresters for the future.”

Native plants key to attracting birds and other predators

Birds need insects and caterpillars to survive

When we think of predators in our Woodland Wildlife gardens the first thing that comes to mind are larger animals – coyotes, foxes, hawks, owls maybe even snakes large and small.

In other words, we often think of predators with a little trepidation that almost always involve animals with big, sharp teeth, or large and powerful claws.

But the reality is that most of our garden predators are either our favourite birds – chickadees, warblers, cardinals and indigo buntings – or tiny creatures often referred to as beneficial insects that we might not even know live in our gardens.

What do they all have in common? They all require a source of protein that is mostly derived in some part by insect herbivores able to convert specific plants into food for predators.

But not all plants – almost always those plants are native plants, shrubs and trees.

A three-tier approach to predators

These predators can be broken into three tiers: Dominant ones like foxes, hawks and owls, followed by second-tier predators (birds, smaller mammals, amphibians and reptiles) and finally third-tier predators made up mostly of predatory insects and larvae.

So many homeowners have serious pest problems because their gardens are not welcoming to the predators and parasites that in natural ecosystems help keep infestations in check. It’s important to note that if we want to encourage a garden in harmony – critical to keep our gardens from getting overrun with caterpillars, mice and rats – we need to focus on providing a food source for all predators and their prey.

A yellow warbler searches tall grass in search of prey. Backyard birds are among the most voracious of predators in our woodland wildlife gardens.

To put it simply, if a natural area is working in harmony, it’s the predators that are keeping everything in check.

For example, the bottom tier of predators (insects, spiders) are often eaten by the middle-tier predators (birds reptiles) who are often eaten by the top-tier predators. But all the predators are dependent in some way on the herbivores that primarily get their sustenance from plants.

Without these multi-tier predators, our gardens would quickly be over run with insect herbivores, but without them, we would have no predators and that includes birds.

Let’s call it the garden food chain.

The bottom tier of predators is where it begins

So what makes up the bottom tier and how can we invite these predators like beneficial insects into our gardens?

Think the larvae of the delicate green lacewing, a host of beetles, daddy longlegs, small parasitical wasps and tachinid flies, dragonflies and a host of garden spiders that either spin webs or hide out on our flowers ready to pounce on smaller insects all the while helping to keep our plants free from destructive infestations. Many of the best garden predators are actually larvae of larger insects, others are parasitical larvae that develop on or within a victim, ultimately killing it.

As a bonus, these lower-tier predators can also be a fascinating new world of insects to discover and photograph in your garden.

Ask yourself if you are eliminating the lowest tier predators and their prey (caterpillars and other insect herbivores) through the use of pesticides? Or is our overly tidy garden leaving little room for these predators and prey to complete their life cycles? Both can be a death sentence for predator and prey.

“I cannot overemphasize how important insect herbivores are to the health of all terrestrial ecosystems. Worldwide, 37 per cent of animal species are herbivorous insects. These species are collectively very good at converting plant tissue to all types of insect tissue, and as a consequence they also excel at providing food – in the form of themselves – for other species. In fact, a large percentage of the world’s fauna depends entirely on insects to access the energy stored in plants. Birds are a particularly good example of such organisms,”

— Douglas Tallamy

Just last spring, I was visited from an ill-informed young fellow representing a company saying it would spray around our home to eliminate insects. When I pushed back, he added with great conviction that they would also kill all the spiders around the home’s foundation to ensure a spider-free home. That only raised my blood pressure another notch.

He also assured me many of my neighbours had already purchased the service. A sad commentary on the lack of awareness among so many homeowners.

Please, lay off the pesticides. You may have to tolerate some minor infestations if you turn to beneficial insects and parasites to keep your garden in check, but remember that normal populations of “bad guys” are a necessary food source for the beneficials and help keep them in your yard.

It’s a small price to pay for a healthy garden.

Native plants are food for both prey and predators

Once we eliminate pesticides and an overly tidy garden, it’s important to focus on providing the prey with food to attract them to the garden and, in turn, provide predators with a healthy source of food.

The best way to achieve this is through the use of as many native plants as possible. These are plants that have been part of our natural ecosystem for centuries, and plants that our indigenous insects and animals have grown up with for thousands of years.

Unfortunately, many of these plants have become known as weeds to gardeners and lawn companies who turn to herbicides at the first sign of them.

If you are looking to purchase native plants, don’t be fooled by some of the signs at nurseries. Native plants are neither hybridized versions of the the original genus, nor are they plants originally from Asia or countries that share similar growing agricultural zones as ours.

In addition, even plants that may be native to other distant parts of the country we live in, may not be a food source to local prey animals, insects and larvae. A flower that is native to Western United States or Canada, may not provide the necessary traits that local fauna in our garden require.

Why do we need this third-tier predator prey relationship? Without these often overlooked prey species, there is no future for medium-sized predators like our song birds that depend on many of these third-tier predators and prey for protein, especially when rearing their young.

Here are constructive steps courtesy of the National Wildlife Federation that we can take to attract these third-tier predators into our gardens.

• Consider growing as many herbs and wildflowers native to your region. Look for plants that are ideally suited to beneficial insects. These plants often include daisy-like flowers including asters, black-eyed Susans and coneflowers as well as tickseed, goldenrod varieties, sunflowers and milkweeds.

• Work these flowers favoured by predators into your existing planting beds, or mass them into islands throughout the yard to focus both predator and prey to specific areas of the garden.

• Look for native plants that flower at different times. Spring ephemerals will get the woodland going early and provide potential food sources for birds migrating back into your area, while asters and other fall blooming natives will keep the predator-prey relationship going late into fall. This is especially important for birds migrating back to their wintering grounds.

• Combine predator-friendly plants of various heights to create a structurally diverse habitat.

• Don’t remove the fallen leaves from your planting beds. A healthy layer of leaf litter provides habitat for beetles, spiders and other important predators.

• Refrain from killing any insect or larva. You might be surprised what many quite scary-looking larvae become. Consider doing some on-line research into beneficial insects and larvae. Cornell University’s Biological Control: A Guide to Natural Enemies in North America is an excellent resource.

Middle-tier predators: Songbirds, chipmunks and toads…

Finally, let’s take a quick look at the middle-tier predators.

Many in this group may come as a surprise to gardeners who think of them as more prey than predators. Songbirds are probably the most recognizable of these animals we prefer not to recognize as predators. But don’t tell that to the millions of caterpillars, insects and spiders, that make up most of their diet during spring, summer and fall.

Well known entomologist Douglas Tallamy, in his book Bringing Nature Home, How You Can Sustain Wildlife with Native Plants, outlines the importance of these prey animals in his New York Times best seller.

“I cannot overemphasize how important insect herbivores are to the health of all terrestrial ecosystems. Worldwide, 37 per cent of animal species are herbivorous insects. These species are collectively very good at converting plant tissue to all types of insect tissue, and as a consequence they also excel at providing food – in the form of themselves – for other species. In fact, a large percentage of the world’s fauna depends entirely on insects to access the energy stored in plants. Birds are a particularly good example of such organisms,” he writes adding that 96 per cent of birds depend on insects to survive.

Just as an example, Tallamy’s research states that Chickadee parents need to find, depending on the number of chicks they are raising, as many as 570 caterpillars every day to sustain their family. If it takes 16 to 18 days before the babies fledge, that daily figure jumps to between 6,000 and 9,000 caterpillars to bring a clutch of chickadees to maturity.

Providing this amount of food in or around our gardens is necessary to sustain our chickadee population. Multiply this a thousand fold to account for all of the bird species competing for the same food in spring, not to mention frogs, toads, skunks, possums and even tier-one predators like foxes who dine on insects to the count of up to 26 per cent of their diet.

Bats, too, depend on insects eating as many as 1,000 in a single night as well as moths and other flying insects.

It doesn’t take long to realize that our gardens need to produce hundreds of thousands of insects, caterpillars and larvae to sustain only the first and second tier of predators that we hope call our gardens home.

But providing predators with enough food to sustain them and their offspring is not enough. We need a high percentage of these prey animals to escape predation to evolve into adult stage to allow the process to start all over again.

We need a world filled with butterflies, moths, dragonflies, spiders, birds, frogs, hawks, owls, foxes and even coyotes.

If we hope to have success, we have to smart small, and there is no better place to begin than in our gardens.

Why should we use native plants in our gardens?

Native plants trees and shrubs vital to our environment

Why is it so important to grow native plants?

It’s a question many gardeners are asking as the pleas to use native (trees, shrubs and plants) grow louder throughout social media circles, environmental gardeners and even traditional garden clubs.

This move toward native plants has grown steadily as an increasing amount of evidence has come forward to show a direct relationship between native plants and the survival (and abundance) of our native insects and caterpillars.

Why does this matter?

Using native plants matters because insect larvae, caterpillars even egg masses are key to the survival of so many of our birds, reptiles, amphibians and mammals that depend, not just on the existence of these insects, but on an abundance of them in spring to raise their young.

It’s not just the protein the emerging insects provide.

Insects depend on these plants for food and pollinators depend on the flowers their ancestors have visited for thousands of years to raise their young (see Our Native Bees). The pollination of those flowers in spring lead to berries and nuts that provide sustenance for birds, mammals even more insects, which, in turn, provide food for larger predators such as fox, coyotes, owls…

It’s the circle of life in action, but that circle most often starts with the single seed of a native plant.

Native plants are, thankfully becoming more mainstream as more informed gardeners realize the how important these native plants, shrubs and trees are for native wildlife. The proof is that Little Bluestem native grass has been chosen the Top Perennial for 2022. Choosing a grass, rather than a colourful flower is reason enough to think we are making good progress. Be sure to check out my complete article on Little Bluestem.

A combination of milkweed, Black-Eyed Susans and columbines beneath a mature serviceberry tree combine with grasses and ferns welcome native fauna in our front garden.

Experts on the importance of using native plants

I particularly like this line from the website of the Halton Regions Master Gardener’s website talking about the growing popularity of native plant gardening.

“This is an exciting trend as it offers homeowners and gardeners the ability to build a landscape legacy for future generations. The status quo of landscaping solely to ‘decorate your home’ for your own benefit now seems rather empty because of course we share our space with creatures of all kinds. How can we create landscapes only for ‘us’?”

Well said. Indeed, how can we carry on like we have in the past worshipping great swaths of lawn that offer nothing of value to any of our native wildlife.

In her groundbreaking book Grow Wild: Native Plant Gardening in Canada, Lorraine Johnson describes yards she has visited planted with native flowers.

“For starters, the birds are squawking up a riot – an exuberant contrast to the silence next door, where no seedpods or berries or brush exist to lure them. And in the aural spaces between the drone of traffic, you catch a different kind of rhythm: the hum of insects, some losing the battle and becoming bird dinner, others making their way into flowers, drinking captured rainwater, picking up pollen.”

Johnson goes on to describe what she sees growing in the garden: “The winged diversity of this yard has its parallel on the ground too. Instead of the handful of plant choices offered throughout the neighbourhood, there are dozens of different plantings: colorful native meadow plants in the sunny center, and the subdued cooling greens of shady woodlanders in the darker corners. You count 50 species, and those are just the ones immediately identifiable.”

Entomologist Douglas Tallamy, in his book Bringing Nature Home: How You can Sustain Wildlife With Native Plants, (see my earlier story) explains the vital role gardeners are being asked to take on: “Like it or not, gardeners have become important players in the management of our nation’s wildlife. It is now within the power of individual gardeners to do something that we all dream of doing to make a difference. In this case, the “difference” will be the future of biodiversity, to the native plants and animals of North America and the ecosystems that sustain them.”

Native plants are the ecological basis upon which life depends. Without them and the insects that co-evolved with them, local birds cannot survive. For example, Tallamy’s research has shown that native oak trees support more than 500 species of caterpillars.

And what some gardeners might see as a pest is life-giving food to the birds that call our neighbourhoods home.

Chickadees, for example, need from 4,000 to 7,000 caterpillars to raise just one clutch of young, and those caterpillars need to be close to the nest – about 50 feet – otherwise the parent chickadees use too much energy finding the caterpillars.

If it takes more than 6,000 caterpillars to raise one brood of chickadees, the presence of important native trees such oaks, birch and maples are critical to the survival of our birds and other animals.

This outstanding poster created by Justin Lewis shows how native plants help our birds.

Why native plants matter

So this harsh reality begs the question: Why do the plants have to be native to our area?

The fauna (insects, birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians) have depended on these plants for thousands of years. Their digestive systems, even specific body parts, have developed to take advantage of these plants.

In fact, some fauna are linked directly to a single native plant.

The monarch butterfly is a perfect example of the symbiosis between a plant species and fauna. Monarchs depend on milkweeds to raise their young. They lay their eggs only on the milkweed plants where they hatch into tiny caterpillars that feed exclusively on that plant and take up enough of the poisonous milky resin in the plant to make them poisonous to birds and help them to survive as they transform into beautiful monarch butterflies. Without the native milkweed plants, monarchs would not survive.

Time to battle the aliens

Tallamy does not sugar-coat the damage that has already been done by our dedication to growing often invasive, non-native plants.

“My argument for using native plant species moves beyond debatable values and ethics into the world of scientific fact,” he writes. “We can no longer hope to coexist with the other animals if we continue to wage war on their homes and food supplies. This simple tenet provides an imperative, particularly for the bird and butterfly lovers among us, to fight invasive aliens as if it really matters and to reevaluate our centuries-old love affair with alien ornamentals.”

What many gardeners and garden nurseries fail to understand is that, in most situations, only the native species of a plant provide the full benefits to native fauna. Cultivars of our favourite plants promise to solve one problem (mildew powder for example) but in doing so breed out many of the benefits the native species provide. It’s not uncommon, for example, for these cultivars to be sterile or “resistant” to the vary species that are attracted to and dependent on, the native species of that plant.

We all want the perfect plant in our gardens, but do we ever think that those holes in the plant are there because one of our native beetles depend on that plant as a food source? By making the plant indigestible to that beetle, we are denying it a valuable food source for the sake of garden aesthetics and, in doing so, signing its death notice over time.

These cultivars might look great in the garden but many do little to nothing to help the species that depend on them.

I love our beautiful Cornus Kousa dogwood trees in our garden. Unfortunately, they are an example of plants that have been introduced to our area from Asia that offer very little to local wildlife. Although these dogwoods act much the same as our native Florida Dogwood species by putting out a profusion of flowers that last well into the summer, followed by strawberry-sized red fruit, very few, if any of our local wildlife benefit from these trees.

The native dogwoods, however, are magnets for a range of insects, caterpillars, birds and mammals that have grown up with them over centuries and depend on them for sustenance. (see article on best dogwoods)

The sad fact is that the introduced Cornus Kousa dogwoods may well have brought with them a disease that is killing our native dogwood. Anthracnose, a disease that attacks native dogwoods (cornus florida) and eventually kills them, is suspected to have come into North America in the 1970s with the importation of the Kousa dogwoods which do not suffer from the bacteria.

“It is highly likely that dogwood anthracnose was imported into the United States on kousa dogwoods from Asia because it escaped detection at quarantine facilities.” Tallamy writes.

In our garden, we have both native and non-native dogwoods.

We are delighted to have the spring azure butterfly in our garden, thanks to the presence of our Florida Dogwood. It’s certainly not thanks to the impressive Kousa Dogwoods in our yard.

Tellamy writes: “The diminutive spring azure (Celastrina ladon), one of the first butterflies to become active as the days warm up in spring, may become a resident of your yard if you plant flowering dogwood (Cornus florida) or any of our native Viburnum species. They won’t appear if you insist on kousa dogwood (C. kousa) from Asia. Azures will have nothing to do with that alien.”

The Canadian Wildlife Federation website points out that the Karner Blue butterfly is endangered because its larval host plant, the wild lupine, is increasingly rare. Today’s abundant, non-native lupines do not offer the Karner Blue butterfly the source of food it’s caterpillar needs to survive.

“While all plants can provide shelter, and ornamentals with berries can provide some food, native plants offer the greatest benefit because they also support a wide variety of insects that provide a source of protein for many animals. These insects are especially necessary for local bird populations when they are raising young. Many people use bird feeders to attract birds. Another way of attracting birds is by utilizing native plants in the landscape.”

Native trees, shrubs and plants (zones 5-6)

The following are just a few of the more popular native trees, shrubs and flowering plants and grasses in Ontario and N.E. United States.

The list was compiled by landscape designer Angela den Hoed for the Woodland Wildlife garden design she created for Ferns & Feathers and lists the number of species the plant supports.

These trees provide both habitat and food in the form of caterpillars and insects for birds.

Oak – Willow (Quercus phellos), Pin (Q. palustris), or Bur (Q. macrocarpa): Oak trees support the highest quantity of wildlife of any plant in the region including 519 species. Their acorns also provide food for other wildlife.

Maple – Red (Acer rubrum) or Sugar (A. saccharum): Support 293 species. It may be easier to find a maple the appropriate size for a small garden.

Understory Trees

Crabapple – American/Sweet (Malus coronaria): Flowers in spring and provides fruit in the fall and throughout the winter. Supports 287 species.

Dogwood – Flowering (Cornus florida) or Pagoda (C. alternifolia): Flowers in spring and supports 124 species.

Plum - American (Prunus americana) or Chokecherry (P. virginiana): Plums are #2 on the list of trees in terms of the number of butterflies and moths they support (435). These will flower in the spring and provide berries for birds in the fall.

Serviceberry – Canadian Serviceberry (Amelanchier canadensis) or Allegheny Serviceberry (A. laevis): These also bloom in late spring, support 135 species and provide birds food in the form of berries in the fall.

Magnolia – Sweetbay Magnolia (Magnolia virginiana): Supports 20 species including a few that can only live on Magnolias.

Shrubs to consider

Arrowwood Viburnum (Viburnum dentatum): Spring flowers lead to blue-black berry like drupes that are an ideal fuel for bird migration. 111 species supported

Inkberry Holly (Ilex glabra) ‘Gembox’: 44 species supported

Red Osier Dogwood (Cornus sericea) – ‘Arctic Fire’: White flower, blue drupes in summer, red fall color, bright red branches in winter. Like the dogwood tree, supports 44 species

Pinxterbloom Azalea (Rhododendron periclymenoides): Pink flowers in spring, supports 53 species

Oakleaf Hydrangea (Hydrangea quercifolia) ‘Ruby Slippers’ or ‘Munchkind’: Supports 10 species.

New Jersey Tea (Ceanothus americana): White flowers in spring, supports 44 species.

Summersweet/Sweet Pepperbush (Clethra alnifolia) ‘Ruby Slippers’: Fragrant pink flowers in summer, attracts hummingbirds and pollinators.

Perennials to consider

• White Wood Aster (Aster divaricatus): White flowers late summer, supports 115 species

• Columbine (Aquilegia canadensis): Red flowers in spring, Supports 12 species.

• Cinnamon Fern (Osmunda cinnamomea): Cinnamon red new growth, supports 7 species.

• Virginia Bluebells (Mertensia virginica): Blue flowers in spring, supports 3 species.

• Early Meadow Rue (Thalictrum dioicum): Greenish yellow flowers in spring, supports 15 species.

• Short’s Aster (Symphyotrichum shortii): Blue-violet flowers in fall, supports 11 species.

• Goat’s Beard (Aruncus dioicus): Tall white flowers in May.

• Coral Bells (Heuchera villosa) ‘Autumn Bride’: White flowers late summer.

• Tall Thimbleweed (Anemone virginiana): White flowers in summer, supports 2 species.

• Foamflower (Tiarella cordifolia): White or pink flowers in May.

Ground covers to consider

• Dwarf Crested Iris (Iris cristata): Blue-violet flowers in April, supports 13 species.

• Wild Ginger (Asarum canadense): Burgundy flowers in spring at the ground.

• Wild Blue Phlox (Phlox divaricate): Blue flowers in spring, supports 3 species.

• Wild Geranium (Geranium maculatum): white, pink, or purple flowers in spring, supports 27 species.

Other reasons to grow native plants

Of course there are lot of good reasons to grow native plants that are not related to the protection of our native flora and fauna.

The U.S. Forest Service points out some of the benefits on its website.

• They are adapted to the local climate and soil conditions.

• They do not require fertilizers and require fewer pesticides than lawns.

• Their deep-root systems increase the soil’s capacity to store water and can signinficantly reduce water runoff and, consequently, flooding.

• Native plants help reduce air pollution. (Not only do they not require mowing and the resulting carbon from the burning of fossil fuels, the plants actually sequester, or remove, carbon from the air.

• Native plants provide shelter and food for wildlife.

• Native plants promote biodiversity and stewardship of our natural heritage

What is a native plant?

The question is often asked: What exactly makes up a native plant?

The simple answer is that a native plant is one that has not been introduced by humans. One that has grown naturally for centuries and in doing so has become uniquely adapted to local environmental conditions.

Lorraine Johnson defines native plants as “a species that has evolved in association with all the features of a place and developed specific and important functional relationships and interactions that contribute to the specificity and identity of that place.”

Milkweed, the only food source for the caterpillars of Monarch butterfly, growing happily in our front garden alongside black-eyed Susans.

A native plant versus a naturalized plant

Many gardeners mistake native plants with naturalized plants. Just because they may freely reproduce and are abundant in the zone we live in does not mean they are native. Some may have been around for decades or even longer but they are still not natives.

Naturalized plants are often described as an exotic plant that manages to reproduce naturally in a specific environment.

A good example that we are all familiar with is the common dandelion. They have surely been around forever and we all know how easily they reproduce from seed.

So dandelions are naturalized plants that actually have some benefit to local fauna.

Other common plants, let’s say the daylily, cannot spread to new areas without human intervention. The daylily can grow in size through rhizomous growth but if you find it growing in a wild area, it got there not by seed but through the transplanting of its rhizome.

Invasive plants are defined by their spreading habit that actually results in an altering of the natural ecosystems around them, where they often dominate natural species crowding them out and eventually resulting in their death. The Norway maple, purple loosestrife, buckthorn and giant hogweed are just a few examples of invasive exotic species.

Many of these invasive, naturalized non-native flora species can still have benefits to local fauna, but in general, they do more harm than good. The use of a native plant as an alternate would be preferable.

In her 1998 groundbreaking book, Johnson writes of the importance of gardeners adopting a more environmental, native based style of gardening.

“You don’t need acres and acres of “pristine” wilderness to have a positive impact; indeed, it’s probably in those areas most stressed by urban pressures – denuded, defoliated and in decline – that we can make the biggest difference.

“By gardening with native plants, you are taking a giant leap toward ecological balance. she writes.

Have her words struck a chord with gardeners since she wrote the book in 1998?

Most definitely.

Is there more work to do?

Absolutely.

“We’ve got more than enough anyplaces already,” she wrote. …What we need are more landscapes, more gardens, that truly reflect the variety and vitality of each community’s character – and by community, I mean not just the human inhabitants but the communities of plants and animals which contribute so much to our identity our sense of where exactly it is that we call home.”

“With native-plant gardening, we become what the bioregional philosophers call dwellers in the land – partners, not parasites; participants, not parallel players; dwellers; not dictators.”

Certainly, a goal worth pursuing.

More information on native plants.

North American Native Plants Societies (find one near you)

Audubon: Why native plants matter.

Carolinian Canada Invasive Species list

More links to my articles on native plants

Why picking native wildflowers is wrong

Serviceberry the perfect native tree for the garden

The Mayapple: Native plant worth exploring

Three spring native wildflowers for the garden

A western source for native plants

Native plants source in Ontario

The Eastern columbine native plant for spring

Three native understory trees for Carolinian zone gardeners

Ecological gardening and native plants

Eastern White Pine is for the birds

Native viburnums are ideal to attract birds

The perfect Redbud

The Carolinian Zone in Canada and the United States

Dogwoods for the woodland wildlife garden

Bringing Nature Home by Douglas Tellamy

A little Love for the Black-Eyed Susan

Native moss in our gardens

Best plants and shrubs to attract birds naturally and save money

Beyond the Bird feeder: Best plants to feeds birds naturally

Attracting birds to your yard with a host of feeders is a great way to experience our feathered friends, but the ultimate goal is to create a natural backyard bird-feeding garden that attracts a greater variety of birds and does it more efficiently and for less cost.

That’s not to say we put away the feeders completely. Our feeding station, for example, provides countless hours of enjoyment. It’s daily entertainment I can’t imagine ever living without.

But, let’s face it, feeding backyard birds with commercial seed gets expensive, fast.

If you’re like me, both the look of the feeders and their quality are significant factors in the decision to make a purchase. But the real cost of feeding birds is the weekly or monthly seed costs that keep adding up. Specialty seed, suet, meal worms … the choices are endless.

These concentrated locations where the birds feed can also be a magnet for unwanted visitors to our garden such as an abundance of rats and mice. Best to keep them at bay.

And, let’s not forget the troubling fact that seed-eating birds make up only a small percentage of the bird species that might visit our yards. Despite the high costs and great troubles we go through to feed the birds, we are really missing out on a large segment of the bird species who put seeds lower on their list of favourite foods. A garden or areas of the garden dedicated to attracting birds naturally is an excellent way to experience a greater variety of birds in their natural habitat.

Cardinal in crabapple tree on the lookout for a caterpillar to bring back to the nest.

Ten simple steps to attract birds naturally

1. Design food islands throughout your garden

2. Plant native, berry producing shrubs and trees that provide food in summer, fall and winter

3. Ensure you have a selection of native flowers that attract insects and supply birds with seeds

4. Eliminate pesticides to save insects for insect-eating birds

5. Build a wood or brush pile in a corner of your yard

6. Ensure there are several sources of water available including on-ground pools

7. Create safe habitat for nesting birds with evergreen and thorny shrubs

8. Allow areas of the garden to go wild to maximize foraging areas for insect-eating birds

9. Allow fruit to rot to encourage more insects for birds

10. Slowly move away from a reliance on commercial feeders and bird seed.

In this post, I’ll take a deep dive into how we can create a natural, backyard bird-feeding garden, to keep the birds exploring our backyard long after most of the store-bought bird feeders and expensive seed are gone.

This excellent poster was created by Justin Lewis and is best viewed on a tablet or desktop.

Convincing birds to come to our yards for reasons other than a large cylinder of sunflower seeds involves a multi-faceted approach that may require several years of garden design planning focusing on creating natural habitat, including islands of fruit, nut and seed producing trees, shrubs and flowers that serve a variety of bird species from warblers to woodpeckers. Fruit-bearing shrubs such as viburnums and serviceberries can be supplemented with seed-bearing flowers such as Black-eyed Susans, sunflowers and Asters. Of course there is an oak tree, dogwoods and evergreens in the mix for nuts, berries and nesting habitat.

Deciding on the best trees, shrubs and flowers for our natural backyard bird-feeding garden will depend a lot on where you live, the size of your backyard and how dedicated you are to creating a natural backyard bird feeder.

This post, however, will help to get you started by listing many of the best trees, shrubs, vines and flowers birds use as food sources, and what birds depend on these sources for food.

Ten best shrubs and trees to attract birds

Serviceberry (Amelanchier) Zones 4-8, Every natural bird feeding garden needs a serviceberry. Two or three are even better. I think at last count I had four growing throughout our woodland garden. What makes the serviceberry so important for birds is its early summer yield of delicious deep red almost purple berries. These provide an early feast for birds either just before or during the nesting period. A favourite in our garden of robins waxwings, orioles, woodpeckers, chickadees, cardinals, jays mourning doves, vireos and finches as well as red squirrels and chipmunks. The early spring flowers (early May in our area) attract an abundance of insects which birds are also attracted to as a food source. For more information on serviceberries, check out my earlier story here.

Beautyberry Bushes (Callicarpa Americana) Zones 5-8, If these shrubs provided no value to the birds, I would still grow them in my garden, they are that nice. But it’s their incredible purple berries that grow in clusters close to the stem of branches that make them such attractive little shrubs and is the draw for birds to your garden. These bright purple fruits are attractive to several birds that might not be regulars to your feeders including Mockingbirds, Robins, Brown Thrashers and Northern Bobwhites.

Chokecherry (Prunus virginiana) Zones 2-7 is a suckering shrub or small tree that grows to between 3 and 19 feet and produces flowers in racemes followed by its fruit that can range from bright red to black. It is found naturally in the northern half of the United States and across southern Canada. Although the shrub plays host to tent caterpillars, it remains an important food source for native birds. For bird lovers, the tent caterpillars are an added bonus. The fruit of the chokeberry ripens from July through to October but doesn’t drop to the groun, instead remaining on the branches throughout winter providing a winter food source for up to 70 species of birds.

American Cranberry Bush (Viburnum Trilobum) and other viburnums zones 2-7 The American cranberry is a mid-size shrub (8-10 feet tall and wide) with its white clusters of spring flowers and stunning rusty red fall foliage is impressive in itself, but it’s the berries on this viburnum that make it shine. Viburnums can be grown as a shrub or small trees and is available in a number of species. Watch for, among others, robins, bluebirds, thrushes, catbirds, cardinals, finches, waxwings to visit your viburnums.

Blackberries (Rubus spp) If you have a corner of the yard you don’t mind giving over to the birds, the blackberry (although considered invasive in some areas) is an excellent choice. The thorny plants provide some protection for nesting birds and because blackberries begin fruiting in late spring and early summer, they provide a good food source during the breeding season. You can expect various warblers, orioles, tanagers, thrashers, mockingbirds,, catbirds and robins, among others to visit your blackberry bushes.

The Flowering Dogwood is a beautiful native addition to any garden but its real superpower is how many birds love to eat its berries, including Eastern Bluebirds.

Dogwood (various Cornus species) zones 5-9 Dogwoods are an obvious choice when it comes to feeding birds naturally. Although they are best known to humans for their early spring blooms, the birds are drawn to the many varieties for their abundance of high-fat content. Popular choices include the pagoda dogwood (Cornus Alternifolia), Flowering dogwood (Cornus Florida), and red twigged dogwood (Cornus Baileyi.) It is said that more than 40 types of birds feed on dogwood berries including bluebirds and other members of the thrush family, woodpeckers, catbirds, thrashers and mockingbirds.

Elderberry Sambucus zones 4-9 This fast-growing deciduous shrub is favourite in our garden for the abundance of purplish-blue summer berries that follow the plant’s clusters of white flowers in spring. The flowers also attract pollinating insects which also provide a food source for birds in early spring. The berries are a favourite of a number of birds including those hard-to-attract warblers, orioles, colourful tanagers, catbirds, thrashers, mockingbirds and waxwings. Although the native species are always best to plant, Proven Winners Black Lace and Lemony Lace hybrids are outstanding editions to any garden and can easily substitute for Japanese maples.

Proven Winners describe their Black Lace elderberry as having “intense purple black foliage that is finely cut like lace, giving it an effect similar to that of Japanese maple. Pink flowers in early summer contrast with the dark leaves for a stunning effect and give way to black berries if a compatible pollinator is planted nearby.”

It’s their Lemony Lace version that I enjoy the most in our garden. The same finely cut foliage is here but in a golden or chartreuse colour to lighten up your landscape. The large clusters of white flowers in early spring before the foliage emerges are followed by berries. And they are deer resistant.

Juniper Juniperus Zones 3-9 Junipers are key sources of food and habitat for wintering birds. Their thick foliage provides ideal places for birds to escape cold winds and offer both nesting habitat and fruit for many birds. They can be grown as a shrub or tree and attract everything from warblers, grosbeaks, jays, sapsuckers, woodpeckers, waxwings bluebirds, robins, thrashers bobwhites and even wild turkeys.

Chokeberry Aronia Arbutfolia zones 4-9 Is a favourite of many birds. Its rather unimpressive spring blooms give way to bright red berries in summer and into fall when winter birds such as Cardinals and woodpeckers

Holly including Winterberry Ilex Verticillata zones 3-9 Holly is an ideal plant to attract birds with its colourful fruit ranging from red to yellow, orange to black and white. Of the more than 400 species that range from shrubs to large trees, hollies are primarily evergreen. Some, however, like winterberry, are deciduous. These are excellent sources of winter food for birds. The fruit ripens in the fall and can last all winter into early spring where they can provide a source of food for migrating birds or new arrivals. You can count on the red berries in the fall and winter to provide a natural food source for birds such as Bluebirds, woodpeckers, catbirds, thrashers and mockingbirds to name just a few.

Pagoda dogwood flowers in spring before giving way to an abundance of black fruit that the birds can't get enough of in the summer.

Best flowers to attract birds

It’s easy to see the direct relationship between birds and the many shrubs and small trees discussed above. The birds are obviously attracted to the fruit and sometimes the seeds of shrubs and trees. Indirectly, the insects that might be attracted to the fruits also serve as food for the birds foraging in our gardens.

That relationship is often not quite as obvious when it comes to the flowers we plant in our gardens. Aesthetics is usually the driving force behind planting a particular type of flower in our garden. Their attractiveness to pollinators and, perhaps, hummingbirds is sometimes the motivating factor behind planting flowers, but rarely do we give a lot of thought to the birds the flowers may attract. Here are a selection of flowers that will bring birds into your yard in search of the food they provide in one form or another. Let’s examine them in more detail.

Aster: The New England Aster, often seen growing on roadsides and in open fields in scrub land, is a good example of an important food source for birds in our backyard. This herbaceous perennial that can range anywhere between 3 feet to 6 feet in height puts out its colourful blooms in late summer into fall making it an important food source for migrating birds.

Its yellow centre surrounded in purple rays makes it a colourful addition to any garden at a time when most other flowers are disappearing. That’s the secret to the flowers’ importance for our native birds. This late bloom provides many insect species with vital autumn nectar creating an abundance of activity around the flowers, in turn providing an important food source for insectivorous birds right before or during migration.

Don’t be surprised to find an intensity of bird activity in your yard right at the time you think the birds are heading south. If that does not convince you to plant this hardy plant, consider that the seeds of New England Aster are also a food source for many birds including the White-Breasted Nuthatch (see earlier post here on attracting nuthatches), Black-Capped chickadees and American Goldfinches. Other backyard birds that may feed on Asters or the insects attracted to them are Blue Jays, Juncos, Indigo Buntings, Cardinals, Eastern Towhee, Ruby-Throated Hummingbirds and the Titmouse.

Black-Eyed Susans: Similar to the Aster, the Black-Eyed Susan is a late summer/fall bloomer that is a magnet for insects and, therefore, a good food source for insect-eating birds. Ranging from 2 to 3 feet in height, the Black-Eyed Susan and its many cultivars, also provide birds – especially American Goldfinches – with a source of food throughout the winter months. It’s important not to cut the stems of these plants down in fall. Leaving them standing provides both interest in the garden as snow builds up on them as well as an easily attainable food source for birds foraging in winter when there are fewer sources available to them. Many of the same birds that are attracted to Asters also depend on Black-Eyed Susans for a late fall and winter food source.

Coneflower: Falls into the same category as the Aster and Black-Eyed Susans when it comes to a food source for birds. The Purple Coneflower, with its prickly centre disk, is a favourite of many butterflies which, in turn are favoured by insect-eating birds. In addition to many of the birds mentioned above, Purple Coneflowers also attract Pine Siskins and Mourning Doves.

Columbine: Our native columbine is a woodland favourite that we know is especially attractive to hummingbirds. The red and yellow coloured flowers of our native columbine (see earlier post here) are rich with nectar and an obvious choice for lovers of hummingbirds. This same nectar also attracts a host of insects in early spring and so provides another food source for insect-eating birds from warblers to hummingbirds themselves. The seeds of the columbine may also attract various finches, including the Purple Finch.

Sunflowers: It’s no secret that the best flower you could plant in your garden as a food source for a host of birds is the mighty sunflower. Considering it’s the number one seed in our feeders, it only makes sense that we put it on our list of must-haves in our bird garden.

When one thinks of sunflowers, however, the first ones that come to mind are the massive Russian mammoths that can easily grow to 10 feet in height with their enormous flowers giving off an almost magical feel to our gardens.

These big boys are a great food source, make the perfect landing spots to photograph the birds, and a fun addition to the garden, but consider planting the native perennial varieties of Sunflower as well.

The native perennial Sunflowers, often referred to as the Woodland Sunflower, is much smaller, attracts bees and other insects, including many butterfly species including Checkerspot and Painted Ladies. It grows to between 2.5- and 6-feet tall with a central stem that becomes branched where the flowerheads occur. The blooms can last up to two months in mid-summer into early fall.

These long-rhizomatous plants often grow in large colonies in the wild where they grow in full or partial sun. It can spread aggressively if left unchecked and seems to be happy in most soils including loamy, sandy or rocky areas. It is pollinated by a host of native bees and is host plant to a number caterpillars to native butterflies making it an important source of food for insect-eating birds. Plant it along your woodland edges in full sun alongside Black-Eyed Susans and Bee-Balms for a stunning display and an insect/bird magnet.

The list of birds attracted to sunflowers is too long to list but includes Downy Woodpeckers, Indigo Buntings, Pine siskins, Purple Finches and Rose-Breasted Grosbeaks.

Don’t forget vines

Vines can be an important addition to a woodland wildlife garden providing nesting habitat as well as a food source for birds in the form of berries and the insects that are often attracted to these berries. One of the most important native vines for birds is Virginia Creeper.

Virginia Creeper: If you do nothing in your garden, there is a good chance that you will eventually have some Virginia Creeper in your garden. We have it in several spots in our woodland garden either growing along the ground or creeping up large trees. There is a reason why Virginia Creeper is so prevalent – birds love its fruit and are quick to spread the seeds either in the wild or in our gardens. That’s a good sign and one that this is an important native plant to attract birds to our gardens.

This deciduous vine grows between 30 to 50 feet with a spread of between 5 to 10 feet. It blooms from May to August, but its magnet is the berries it produces in the fall. The berries are a favourite of a long list of birds but most notable are the American Robin, Brown Thrasher, Cape May Warbler, Cedar Waxwing, Eastern Bluebird, Hermit Thrush, Eastern Phoebe, Scarlet Tanager, Yelow-Rumped Warbler, Pine Warbler, Red-Bellied Woodpecker, to name just a few.

Perhaps where many of us fall short in our attempt to attract the more unusual birds to our backyard is that we rely to heavily on providing food sources for our feathered friends, whether that is through commercial bird feeders or by planting an extensive array of native trees, shrubs, vines and flowers.

While food is a key ingredient to success, it’s important not to forget that birds are looking for a number of factors before they decide to raise their young in a particular area or backyard. By meeting as many of these needs as possible, we will be able to attract a greater variety of birds including those that are not normally common in backyards. Most of these more uncommon birds are primarily the insect eaters.

The following are important steps that, in addition to commercial feeders and planting native flora, will drive these birds into our yards.

I will not go into great detail here but, instead, urge you to explore my other posts on these important topics.

Build a wood or brush pile to attract wildlife

Build a brush or woodpile: Creating a brush pile in a corner of your yard can be a real draw for backyard wildlife ranging from small mammals, reptiles, amphibians and, of course insects. This in turn attracts the attention of birds, including raptors such as hawks and owls, in search of mice and other rodents – think rats - that might want to take up residence in your garden. I have two separate brush piles in our garden.

One is similar to an open compost of garden debris – branches, dried ornamental grasses, some fall leaves, mixed with spend soil from last year’s containers and hanging baskets – that is now well over 6-feet high and at least 12 feet in diameter. It is home to snakes, mice, chipmunks and who knows what else. I have seen a Cooper’s hawk in one of the branches above the pile just waiting for its dinner.

The other is more a traditional, very open wood pile made up of branches trimmed from out mature trees. I see it as a perfect home for a fox, groundhog or even a skunk although I have not seen any of those animals use it in that way to date. I do know that the top of the wood pile is a favourite spot for our red squirrels to sit and watch over the garden for predators.

For more on creating a wood/brush pile for a wildlife garden go here.

Adding several water sources is key for birds

It’s not enough to add a single bird bath to your backyard and think you’ve met the needs of every bird that might want a drink or bathe in your backyard. Birds can be fussy when it comes to bird baths and water sources.

A natural pond is always the best way to bring in a variety of birds, especially if there are no other natural bodies of water in the area, but many of us don’t want to get involved in setting up and maintaining a natural pond.

Instead, try setting up a series of water sources in your garden combining various styles of bird baths from traditional ones, to on-ground water sources and hanging bird baths.

Remember, though, not all bird baths are created equal.

I have written a comprehensive article on the best bird baths for your backyard. You can read it here.

Some are deep and preferred by larger birds, others are shallow and need to be filled daily but provide safe wading for smaller birds. Other bird baths can include a solar-powered pump to provide moving water.

On-ground water sources are often preferred by birds. We have a concrete leaf that gets tucked into pea gravel and is used constantly by everything from chipping sparrows to chickadees, but is a favourite of our resident chipmunks.

A solar-powered bubbling rock at the head of a dry-river bed provides moving water that birds, squirrels and chipmunks like to use daily.

We have even had a large hawk use one of our three large waterbowls as a bird bath.

By providing a host of water sources, birds can choose the one that they feel most safe. Taking a bath or even taking a drink can be a dangerous time for birds if predators are about. Providing a safe perching area nearby will allow them to case the area before committing to the bird bath as well as provide them an escape hatch if that is necessary.

For my earlier post on providing water for birds in your backyard, go here.

By combining some or all of these suggestions over time, I’m confident a greater variety of birds will find your backyard woodland/wildlife garden and choose to make it their home. Others will use it as one of their many stops on their daily routine and still others will drop down during migration to spend time in an area that meets their needs and helps them restore the energy they need for safe passage on their migration route.

Godspeed little buddies.

Don’t forget vines

Vines can be an important addition to a woodland wildlife garden providing nesting habitat as well as a food source for birds in the form of berries and the insects that are often attracted to these berries. One of the most important native vines for birds is Virginia Creeper.

Virginia Creeper: If you do nothing in your garden, there is a good chance that you will eventually have some Virginia Creeper in your garden. We have it in several spots in our woodland garden either growing along the ground or creeping up large trees. There is a reason why Virginia Creeper is so prevalent – birds love its fruit and are quick to spread the seeds either in the wild or in our gardens. That’s a good sign and one that this is an important native plant to attract birds to our gardens.

This deciduous vine grows between 30 to 50 feet with a spread of between 5 to 10 feet. It blooms from May to August, but its magnet is the berries it produces in the fall. The berries are a favourite of a long list of birds but most notable are the American Robin, Brown Thrasher, Cape May Warbler, Cedar Waxwing, Eastern Bluebird, Hermit Thrush, Eastern Phoebe, Scarlet Tanager, Yelow-Rumped Warbler, Pine Warbler, Red-Bellied Woodpecker, to name just a few.

Perhaps where many of us fall short in our attempt to attract the more unusual birds to our backyard is that we rely to heavily on providing food sources for our feathered friends, whether that is through commercial bird feeders or by planting an extensive array of native trees, shrubs, vines and flowers.

While food is a key ingredient to success, it’s important not to forget that birds are looking for a number of factors before they decide to raise their young in a particular area or backyard. By meeting as many of these needs as possible, we will be able to attract a greater variety of birds including those that are not normally common in backyards. Most of these more uncommon birds are primarily the insect eaters.

The following are important steps that, in addition to commercial feeders and planting native flora, will drive these birds into our yards.

I will not go into great detail here but, instead, urge you to explore my other posts on these important topics.

Build a wood or brush pile to attract wildlife

Build a brush or woodpile: Creating a brush pile in a corner of your yard can be a real draw for backyard wildlife ranging from small mammals, reptiles, amphibians and, of course insects. This in turn attracts the attention of birds, including raptors such as hawks and owls, in search of mice and other rodents – think rats - that might want to take up residence in your garden. I have two separate brush piles in our garden.

One is similar to an open compost of garden debris – branches, dried ornamental grasses, some fall leaves, mixed with spend soil from last year’s containers and hanging baskets – that is now well over 6-feet high and at least 12 feet in diameter. It is home to snakes, mice, chipmunks and who knows what else. I have seen a Cooper’s hawk in one of the branches above the pile just waiting for its dinner.

The other is more a traditional, very open wood pile made up of branches trimmed from out mature trees. I see it as a perfect home for a fox, groundhog or even a skunk although I have not seen any of those animals use it in that way to date. I do know that the top of the wood pile is a favourite spot for our red squirrels to sit and watch over the garden for predators.

For more on creating a wood/brush pile for a wildlife garden go here.

Adding several water sources is key for birds

It’s not enough to add a single bird bath to your backyard and think you’ve met the needs of every bird that might want a drink or bathe in your backyard. Birds can be fussy when it comes to bird baths and water sources.

A natural pond is always the best way to bring in a variety of birds, especially if there are no other natural bodies of water in the area, but many of us don’t want to get involved in setting up and maintaining a natural pond.

Instead, try setting up a series of water sources in your garden combining various styles of bird baths from traditional ones, to on-ground water sources and hanging bird baths.

Remember, though, not all bird baths are created equal.

I have written a comprehensive article on the best bird baths for your backyard. You can read it here.

Some are deep and preferred by larger birds, others are shallow and need to be filled daily but provide safe wading for smaller birds. Other bird baths can include a solar-powered pump to provide moving water.

On-ground water sources are often preferred by birds. We have a concrete leaf that gets tucked into pea gravel and is used constantly by everything from chipping sparrows to chickadees, but is a favourite of our resident chipmunks.

A solar-powered bubbling rock at the head of a dry-river bed provides moving water that birds, squirrels and chipmunks like to use daily.

We have even had a large hawk use one of our three large waterbowls as a bird bath.

By providing a host of water sources, birds can choose the one that they feel most safe. Taking a bath or even taking a drink can be a dangerous time for birds if predators are about. Providing a safe perching area nearby will allow them to case the area before committing to the bird bath as well as provide them an escape hatch if that is necessary.

For my earlier post on providing water for birds in your backyard, go here.

By combining some or all of these suggestions over time, I’m confident a greater variety of birds will find your backyard woodland/wildlife garden and choose to make it their home. Others will use it as one of their many stops on their daily routine and still others will drop down during migration to spend time in an area that meets their needs and helps them restore the energy they need for safe passage on their migration route.

Godspeed little buddies.

As an affiliate marketer with Amazon or other marketing companies, I earn money from qualifying purchases.

What tree should I plant in my backyard?

Four oak trees for your woodland wildlife garden

“We just bought our first house and we want to plant a tree. What’s the best tree to plant?”

It’s a question seen over and over again on gardening forums and one asked at local nurseries on a daily basis.

On Facebook gardening forums, the question is often immediately followed by a host of suggestions from well-meaning gardeners and homeowners offering up ideas ranging from tiny weeping hybrids to non-native, highly invasive trees.

Rarely does the word Oak tree show up.

Let me go on record to say that the best tree you can plant in your backyard woodland wildlife garden is an Oak. There are plenty of reasons to plant one of the 400 species of oak, but nothing is as important as one simple fact: Oaks support the most insect biodiversity of any tree in the woodland.

I remember when we moved into our current home. One of the first things I did in spring was to do an inventory of trees on the property. I was very happy to see a nice young oak tree growing happily in the back of the yard. Today it is a more mature oak that works hard for the birds and wildlife on our property.

If you are interested in exploring the world of shade gardening further, you might like my recent post on The Natural Shade garden.

An oak leaf covered in hoar frost in late fall.

Oaks are good for birds and wildlife

In his book Bringing Nature Home, Douglas Tallamy explains that a 2003 study found that a “single white oak tree can provide food and shelter for as many as 22 species of tiny leaf-tying and leaf folding caterpillars.” And that is just a tiny fraction of the fauna that depend on a single oak tree. In fact, the mighty oak supports 534 species of fauna, more than any other tree we can plant in our gardens.

It is followed by the willows, cherries and plums, in importance to fauna. All good choices when it comes to deciding what tree to plant in your garden.

If the Oak’s importance to wildlife is not enough, consider that of the 400 species of Oak, North America boasts 90 different species with 75-80 in the United States and 10 in Canada.

For more on the importance of oak trees in our garden and natural landscapes take a few moments to check out my other posts on Oak trees:

• From an Acorn to a mighty Oak

• Columnar Oak: Perfect for today’s smaller yards

• Bringing Nature Home by Douglas Tallamy.

Oaks are long-lived trees

Oh, and no need to worry that the tree will die on you and leave a massive hole in the landscape, Oak trees traditionally live for hundreds of years. There’s a good chance your children will be watching the tree enter middle age long after you’re gone.

In Ontario and northeastern United States, that white oak you plant will grow more than 35 metres (that’s more than 114 feet) tall, can live for several hundred years and produce thousands of acorns every year to feed deer, squirrels (including flying, red and gray), chipmunks, wild turkeys, crows, rabbits, bears, mice, opossums, blue jays, quail, raccoons and even wood ducks just to name a few.

As Tallamy points out: “The value of oaks for supporting both vertebrate and invertebrate wildlife cannot be overstated.”

He explains that oaks along with hickories, walnuts and American beech, have stepped up to the plate following the demise of the American chestnut in supplying nut forage for various forms of fauna.

“Every oak tree started out as a couple of nuts who stood their ground.”

— Henry David Thoreau

In addition, oaks – both living and dead – provide nesting cavities for our backyard birds ranging from chickadees, wrens, woodpeckers, owls and even bluebirds.

The tree species real genius, however, is what we alluded to earlier, and that is the astounding number of insect herbivores that oaks support in the forest ecosystem.

“From this perspective, oaks are the quinessential wildlife plants: no other plant genus supports more species of Lepidoptera, thus providing more types of bird food, than the mighty oak,” Tallamy writes.

(If you are wondering what the heck a Lepidoptera is: They represent an order of about 180,000 species in 126 families and 46 superfamilies of insects that includes butterflies and moths. It is one of the most widespread and widely recognizable insect order in the world, and your average oak is full of them.)

12 Cool facts about Oak trees

1) Not all acorns are created equally. Acorns produced by white oaks germinate just days after they fall from the trees. Acorns produced by red oak species germinate the following spring. Keep this in mind if you are trying to grow your woodland from seeds. It is estimated that only 1 in 10,000 acorns become trees.

Acorn hats after squirrels feasted on the fruit of the oak.

2) An oak tree produces about 2,000 acorns every year. These acorns contain plenty of nutrition including large amounts of protein, carbs, fats, phosphorus, potassium, calcium and niacin.

3) The root system of a mature oak tree can total hundreds of miles and its taproot grows vertically for some distance before branching out. This helps to stabilize the massive trees from wind, rain and hurricanes. Although most oak tree roots lie only 18 inches under the soil, depending on conditions, they may spread to occupy a space four to seven times the width of the tree’s massive crown. A good thing to keep in mind if you are planning any major digs or trenching in the area of your favourite oak tree.

4) Walking sticks and katydids mature on oak foliage, so if you have never seen a walking stick, plant an oak.

5) Oak trees appeared about 65 million years ago. They have a long history with records reporting back to the late Cretaceous deposits in North America and East Asia. Their survival might be attributed, in part, to the fact acorns and oak leaves contain tannic acid which helps protect them from deadly fungi and destructive insects

6) Some oak trees are not considered old until they hit the ripe age of 700 years. In fact, they can keep going until they hit 1,000 when growth begins slowing down. On average, however, a typical oak tree lives to be about 200 years of age.

7) During their long lives, an oak tree can produce 10 million acorns.

8) The largest living oak is said to be located in Mandeville, Louisiana. Its also considered one of the oldest clocking in at an estimated 1,500 years old

9) There are more than a few famous oaks in history beginning with the Emancipation Oak on the campus of Hampton University in Virginia which is designated one of the 10 Great trees of the world. The sprawling oak is 98 feet in diameter. In the 1860s, Mary Smith Peake broke the law when she taught African American adults and children how to read under the oaks’ branches.

10) The oak is the national tree of the United States.

11) Oak trees may be known by many in Canada and the U.S. as deciduous trees but, in fact, they can also be evergreen in warmer climates with mild winters.

12) Red Oaks are tough trees and can grow in hardiness zones from 2a through to 8b.

The perfect tree?

Sounds perfect, right? Hold on, there’s even more.

In your lifetime, the tree you plant will actually grow into an outstanding specimen that will have a dramatic impact on your landscape design. It will help to form the upper canopy of your woodland garden and you won’t have to wait until your golden years before you begin appreciating its presence in your landscape.

Its sheer size will help to block out the annoying neighbours and the rustle of its leaves will help to drown out the noise of the neighbourhood.

Too big for your yard?

‘The oaks are a large tree,’ you say. ‘Too big for my typical suburban yard.’

I say go big or go home.

Oaks are not “fast-growing” trees, but because of their eventual size they grow at a good pace. I’m guessing a pin oak planted in your late 20s or early 40s won’t outgrow most yards in your lifetime or the home’s second owners, if ever.

They grow big and strong and their roots run deep enough to give them good stability as they age. All these traits mean that you will not have to wait 40 years for the tree in your backyard to make a real difference in your landscape.

There’s plenty of time to plant smaller, understory trees for your woodland.

Today, we are going big and beautiful. Don’t think about how large the tree will eventually become 50-75-100 years down the road, think 10-20-30 years instead. Most oaks make beautiful specimen trees, but if you have room to plant a few, they make a wonderful canopy cover for woodland gardens.

But, let’s face it, not everyone wants or has room for a mighty oak in their yards, especially in many of today’s smaller urban yards.

I get it. The tree you eventually decide to plant in your yard is a major decision that you will have to live with it for a long time.

Let’s zero in on those Oaks you might want to consider for your yard.

Most oaks fall into two groups: those that derive from the white oak group and those from the red oak.

It’s no surprise that all will do well in rich well-drained soil. That’s the dream world where most of us gardeners don’t live. So, if you have an area in the garden with moist soils, consider planting a pin oak and swamp white oaks. Got dry thin soils? Look to chestnut oaks, white oaks and scarlet oaks.

A local, highly reputable nursery in my area lists 13 oak trees for sale on its web site. The following is just an example of four types of Oaks (with links to the nursery website) that are available to homeowners. Check out a full listings of offerings here.

Four oak trees for the woodland wildlife garden

The White Oak (Quercus alba) is there in all its stately presence. Listed as a “massive and stately shade tree growing 90 feet tall and 70 feet wide with an artistic, wide-spreading habit of growth and good fall colour.” It’s recommended “only for the largest of landscapes” and described as “extremely tough” but slow growing. Its fall colour is an outstanding purple, its canopy is dense with a more or less rounded form.

The Pin Oak (Quercus Palustris) is certainly a better choice for a typical front or backyard growing to 60 feet tall with a spread of 40 feet. It’s a more popular tree in our neighbourhood with its refined pyramidal shape, excellent fall colour and growth that cannot be described as “fast” by today’s standards but nevertheless fast for an oak tree. Often referred to as the swamp Oak, the tree’s dark green leaves in summer provide outstanding red fall foliage. The tree requires loose, acidic soil to perform its best.

The Crimson Spire Oak (quercus ‘Crimson Spire’) is one of several cultivars that offer many of the benefits of the Oak but in a more compact form with an eventual height of 50 feet and a spread of a mere 15 feet. The narrow columnar growth habit and deep red fall colour is ideal for screening out undesireable views while helping out local fauna. The tree’s canopy is very low (typically only three feet from the ground) meaning it does not work as an upper canopy tree in a woodland garden, but its usefulness as a screen and its compact size makes it an important consideration for anyone looking to enhance their garden’s attraction to wildlife. It enjoys full sunlight, is adaptable to both dry and moist locations and, unlike the Pin Oak, is happy in any soil type or pH level. It will do well in an urban environment and is said to even thrive in inner city city environments.

The Bur Oak (Quercus macrcarpa) is the hardiest of the oaks with a height and spread of about 80 feet and a hardiness zone going down to as low as zone 2b. This stately slow grower, with a more rounded form is best for large landscapes. Its tall canopy, ideal for a large woodland landscape design, has dark green foliage and sports glossy lobed leaves that turn coppery-bronze in fall. It’s a slow grower that needs full sun but can live more than 300 years. It will grow in most soils and is considered drought-tolerant once established.

Eastern Mixed Forests: A home for the oaks

Using nature as a guide to draw inspiration for our own landscapes, we need only look at the Eastern Mixed Forests to understand where the mighty oaks are most at home. This region, which includes the forested areas from the Atlantic Coast westward to the Prairie and north to the Great Lakes region, includes several distinct forest types, including the Carolinian forest zone, each characterized by a diffrent group of tree species. The Eastern Mixed forest region occurs east of the Appalachian Mountain ranges and include trees such as the tulip poplar, white and red oaks, American beech and flowering dogwood.

Oak woodlands in the southwest

In the semi-arid regions in the west and southwest, for example, Oak woodlands can be one of the dominant plant communites. The woodlands form transitions zones between the coniferours forests of the higher, more moist areas and the drier grasslands or deserts. They differ from other forests because of their drought-tolerant species such as the oaks, pines, and junipers that dominate the woodlands. Oaks cover the foothills of southern California and the lower mountains of Arizona and New Mexico, while pines and junipers dominate in the areas around the Great Basin, lower rockies and parts of southwestern Texas. These areas experience hot, dry summers and cool, moist winters. Fires are important to maintaining and restoring these oak woodlands.

The final decision

Back to that original question of what tree to plant in your yard. Trying to decide what tree that should be is never easy. If you decide to purchase a large tree, that requires special delivery and planting, it can also be an expensive decision.

For budgetary reason, I always suggest to keep the tree small enough to carry home and plant on your own, but there are situations when a large tree is necessary.

The first thought of many new homeowners is that they don’t want to plant a tree that will eventually outgrow their backyard, yet they love going to a friend’s or relative’s homes where a single large tree forms the backbone of the entire yard. A swing hangs from one of the branches, a couple of chairs under the canopy provide the perfect relief from the hot sun.

Maybe you grew up with a favourite climbing tree that provided hours of enjoyment every summer for you and your friends.

The move these days is to plant small trees with fancy hybridized names and sterile flowers that provide no benefit to wildlife of any kind. I’ll grant you some are cute and have a place in patio containers or near your front entrance, but it’s always a good idea to step out of your comfort zone and go big.

Interior designers beg homeowners not to settle for small furnishings and art work just because they live in a condo or small apartment. There are times to think big.

And, I believe that every yard needs one large tree if possible. And, there is no better choice than the mighty oak.

The birds will thank you. The squirrels, chipmunks, deer and rabbits will reward you. And the earth will give back to you one hundred times over.

Now go plant an oak tree.

Important links for Woodland/Wildlife gardeners

The following is a comprehensive list of links to other articles posted on this website.

• Creating a Woodland/Wildlife garden: How small can a woodland garden be. Link

• Creating a Woodland/Wildlife garden: A complete design plan and planting guide. Link

• Chelsea Award winning garden designer Mary Reynolds. See my earlier post about her book here. Go to Mary’s popular website here where she promotes land stewards to create natural Arks to help protect and restore our natural environments.

• Earlier post on Garden mulch: organic vs non-organic. Link here to my earlier post.

• Earlier post to my favourite ground covers for the woodland garden. Link here to my earlier post

• Earlier post on using a local woodland as inspiration for the woodland garden design. Link here to my earlier post.

As an affiliate marketer with Amazon or other marketing companies, I earn money from qualifying purchases.