Fine Feathered Friends

When I started to think about landscaping my yard, the first thing on my list was that it would incorporate elements to attract birds.



So, over the past 5 years I have added bird feeders, trees and shrubs, bird baths, and a small stone pool with a millwheel fountain. It is very small, but the birds are attracted to the running water. And watching them is definitely a calming influence.


In the summer, I like to grow sunflowers because of the goldfinches. They come in flocks to sit on the flowers and hang upside down to eat the seeds. Since they are the exact same colors as the sunflowers, you don’t notice them until they move. These birds that are so brightly –colored in the summer fade to a dull yellowish gray in the winter. They don’t even look like the same birds until you look really closely and see the faint yellow feathers.



I do not attract any exotic birds but that is OK with me. Just the usual regulars. The little wrens and sparrows are by far the most plentiful and they are so sweet. They actually take turns at the feeder. And it amazes me how they actually kick seeds out of the feeder to the ground so that the ground-feeding birds, like the doves, have something to eat, too. Pretty amazing the way nature works so that the qualities and characteristics that are selected to be passed on genetically are those that promote the species.

I love to feed the birds and have always done so. Some of my first memories are of my mother ripping bread into little pieces to throw out onto our snow-covered back yard to feed the birds. As soon as the bread hit the ground, a whole flock of little birds would descend and create a wonderland.