Helping the Birds with Native Plants
As Austin continues to grow, it is inevitable that wildlife habitat is lost.
Our neighborhood has lots of good bird habitat, and all our mature native trees and other plants are a primary factor. But we are losing a lot of good habitat too, to development projects like the Amber Oaks and D.R. Horton projects on the north side of Lake Creek. So keeping and improving the habitat we have in our yards is getting more important. One straightforward way we can do this is to use plants native to our area when landscaping and gardening.
Native plants provide the best food, cover, and other resources for native wildlife. Our birds are designed to take advantage of the trees and bushes and flowers that have been here historically. They can sometimes use exotic species like Chinaberry trees, but never as well as native trees. Also, many exotic plants do not have the natural checks and balances here that the natives species do. That means they can out-spread and out-compete native plants and replace them in large tracts. Exotic plants with this ability are called invasives, and large tracts of non-native, invasive plants don't make good wildlife habitat.
Commonly Used Invasive Plants and Native Alternatives
Back in January, I attended a native gardening and landscaping workshop offered by Texas Parks and Wildlife and the National Wildlife Federation. Both organizations have plenty of resources for learning more. But one simple thing I got from the workshop was a list of commonly used exotic invasive plants, and locally native plant species that make good alternatives. Then I found a similar (and better) list of common invasive plants and better native alternatives on Austin's Grow Green web site.
So when planning your next yard project, please consider using recommended native plants and avoiding invasive exotics. The birds will appreciate it!
Other Online Resources
Austin's Grow Green web site promotes native plants as a part of its guidelines for improving our local water quality. And it has more information about what you can do in your yard from that point of view. As our community grows this will be very important to protect the quality of Lake Creek.
www.ci.austin.tx.us/growgreen/
Texas Parks and Wildlife has some great resources for native plants as well. Their Texas Wildscapes program is a plan for restoring and protecting wildlife habitat that can be applied anywhere from an urban backyard to a huge ranch in the country.
www.tpwd.state.tx.us/huntwild/wild/wildscapes/
--Mikael Behrens
If you are interested in joining Mikael's Bird Walks, contact him at birdingonbroadmeade@gmail.com
Visit Birding on Broadmeade on the NASWC website.
Bookmark This!
Mikael Behrens has done a wonderful job building a blog about birds in our area. If you enjoy watching birds, you will love the fine pictures he has taken and posted at this site. Visit often!
birdingonbroadmeade.blogspot.com
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