How to Create a Wildlife Habitat in Your Backyard

Attracting wildlife to your backyard is a fun and rewarding experience, and can enhance the enjoyment of any yard. Whether you live in the city, on a small suburban lot or in a rural area with lots of property, you can provide the basic necessities needed to attract the local wildlife into your yard. Start small, and expand your wildlife habitat over time. Providing for the birds and animals in your yard has a positive impact on wildlife far beyond the boundaries of your property line.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

1. 

   Every wildlife habitat includes four essential ingredients: food, water, nesting sites and protection from weather and predators. If your yard already contains a few trees and shrubs, then you are well on your way towards creating a backyard habitat. Adding a bird bath or small pond, a few bird houses and a couple of bird feeders will encourage more wildlife to visit and perhaps take up permanent residence in your yard.

2. Encourage more and different types of wildlife into your yard by adding perennial and annual flowers, either planted in the ground or in containers. Nectar producing blooms will attract hummingbirds, butterflies, honey bees and other beneficial insects. Let the last flowers of the summer turn to seed, and birds will feast on the ripen seed pods throughout the fall and winter months. Planting fruit and berry producing trees and shrubs such as dogwoods, crabapple and blueberries will increase the variety of available food for both year round residents as well as seasonal and migratory visitors.

3. 

   A small bird bath filled daily with fresh, clean water provides another reason for birds and insects to visit your yard. A small pond with a waterfall or fountain adds sound and visual appeal, and a permanent water feature will attract frogs and damsel flies. Adding a few aquatic plants creates another micro-environment for insects and pond fish to breed and hide.

4. Hanging bird seed and suet feeders will supplement the other natural foods that you have added into your expanding wildlife habitat. Fill the feeders with black oil sunflower and thistle seeds to provide essential proteins and fats to the diets of visiting birds, especially during the colder months when food sources become scarce. A few well placed bird houses, suited to the birds in your area, provide protected nesting areas to raise their young.

5. If space allows, consider letting a section of your yard to grow naturally. This will encourage native weeds and grasses to take hold, further increasing the diversity of your backyard habitat. Add a small brush pile to create additional cover and nesting potential for a variety of birds, bugs and other critters.

6. 

   Transforming a sterile suburban lawn or a city plot into a miniature wildlife oasis does not need to be difficult, expensive or expansive, and can become a life-long passion. As you modify your surrounding environment to invite the local wildlife into your yard, share the joy and knowledge gained with your neighbors. Who knows… maybe they will create their own adjacent wildlife habitat, and in turn inspire their neighbors. Every little bit helps.

Resources

• Certify your backyard habitat with the National Wildlife Federation
• How to Build a Decorative Bat House for Your Backyard

[askapeach]

on 10/7/2009 This is something I hope to do now that we have a great backyard. Well written and informative article!