Visit! This time the visitors don't come in through the front door, but they fly straight into the backyard. Birds like to visit people in the fall and winter. With some simple tips you can turn your backyard into a bird paradise.
No matter how small your garden is, it is always big enough to receive birds. Even the smallest balcony can be very busy. Long-tailed tits that fly in and out in search of food. Starlings that happily flutter around the fat ball or great tits that scare each other for that very last peanut. Many garden birds like to visit people. In the gardens they find food, shelter and, if all goes well, even breed. Do you want that too? Then follow these tips.
Do you know which birds live near you? Different birds live in a garden on the edge of the forest than on a balcony in Hartje Amsterdam. Do the Bird Protection postcode bird check and discover which birds live in your area. tawny owl? Great Spotted Woodpecker? Great tits and blue tits? Maybe the house sparrow? You find out by simply entering your zip code. Thanks to the counts of, among others, the Garden Bird Count, the Bird Protection knows exactly which birds live where.
After a cold night, birds wake up with a rumbling stomach. To survive the winter months they have to eat a lot, while there is much less food to be found. A tiny bird like the goldcrest, for example, has to gather its own body weight in food every day. So all help is welcome!
Birds are sensible eaters. They are always looking for variety in their diet. There's a lot they like:a fat ball, peanut garland, bird peanut butter, seed mixes, sunflower seeds and small pieces of fruit go well. Do not give large amounts at once. The food can spoil, but you can also attract vermin with it.
With some lard or ox white you can easily make fat balls and bird pies yourself. This animal fat is soft in itself, so you can easily knead nuts, seeds and fruit through it. An hour in the fridge and the fat is hard enough to hang.
No matter how varied a bird eats, not everything is healthy for them. Therefore, do not give them butter or margarine. This gives them diarrhoea, and their plumage is no longer waterproof when soft butter is applied. Salted or roasted peanuts and regular peanut butter are also not good for birds, because they contain too much salt.
There is no better shelter for a bird in winter than a bush or hedge. Even the most shy bird will venture onto the feeding table when it is next to an evergreen ivy, firethorn or barberry. But a nest box is also a good hiding place in winter. Some birds even hide here all at once. For example, forty wrens have been found in one nest box!
What a nest box looks like doesn't really matter to a bird. He is really unimpressed by a purple and green birdhouse, so paint on the go. The opening, that's what matters. The size of this hole determines which birds will enter. Always hang the opening of a nest box towards the north or east. That way the rain and wind can't get in. Look at my bird garden for tips on how to hang a nest box in such a way that the birds will definitely come to it.
Birds love berries. They not only find it very tasty, because of the high vitamin content it is also very good for them. With a berry bush, the birds will certainly come to visit. For example, the holly, dwarf medlar, hazel and Gelderse Rose have berries in winter. With several berry bushes next to each other you create a tasty hedge for the birds, which they can enjoy all year round.
What about garden maintenance in the winter? The messier the better for the birds. Fallen branches and leaves are a nice place to hide when danger threatens. In addition, all kinds of critters crawl and crawl on it, which is another tasty snack in between. Because most people are not interested in a slightly derailed garden, you can also choose to create a cluttered corner. Make yourself comfortable and wipe all the leaves in a pile in the corner and let it rest.
So it can be that simple. This will not only please the birds, but also yourself. It is a joy to see all those birds fluttering in the garden. But did you know that a green garden is also very healthy? After a heavy rain shower, the water flows away more easily and there is no flooding. It is also more pleasant in a green garden during a warm summer.
*Photo credits Shutterstock/Jelle deJong
