Gardening for songbirds

The sound of songbirds lifts our spirits. These ethereal creatures fill our gardens with their beautiful song, but not all birds are songbirds. 

Songbirds have a highly developed voice box which enables them to create complex and very beautiful calls. Their songs are used to delineate their territory, protecting their patch from competitors and they sing loud and long to attract their mates. The pure sound of bird song as dawn breaks and the sun rises is called the dawn chorus. It’s a magical, powerful sound that reminds us of the joy of nature.

But songbirds are in decline and their survival is in the balance. Fortunately, gardeners and people with gardens can and do make a big difference.

Supporting Garden Songbirds

There are several simple ways that you can garden and support your garden songbirds. You probably do these anyway, but it’s always good to have a checklist.

• Provide shelter – Trees, shrubs and hedges provide vital roosting sites and shelter for garden birds. They can flit around within the stems and branches to escape predators and gain shelter.
• Natural food – plant trees and shrubs that offer fruit nuts and berries. Don’t forget the seed eating birds, these will feed on all sorts of seed heads, even dandelions in and around the garden. Good plants for seed eaters include sunflowers and beech trees. You can plant in spring, but the best time to plant trees and shrubs is in the autumn. 
• Feeding Station – install a feeding station for the birds and present a range of different feeders to support all the species of songbirds and garden birds. Richard’s freshly formulated Bird Food contains only top-quality ingredients designed to feed the birds better and provide more energy. For the ground feeders the new Suet Balls are a softer mix and ideal for crumbling on a low feeding table. Keep your feeders clean and topped up. Remove any food that gets wet in the rain, clean the feeders and start again.
• Nesting sites – the birds will naturally nest within dense hedges and shrubs, but a few nest boxes provide the perfect des res for blue tits and other garden birds. Make sure your nest-boxes are clean and ready for this year.
• Nesting materials – birds will collect all sorts of material from the garden to build their nests. Some use wet mud to hold a nest together. Others collect moss and even pet hair to line the nest for their eggs. Fluffy seed heads, dried grass and even leaves can all end up in the structure of a bird’s nest.
• Bird Bath – fresh water is vital for all wildlife. A bird bath provides vital drinking and bathing water. Be sure to keep it clean and free of ice at all times. Remember to keep it topped up in hot weather.
• Go no mow. You might wonder how not mowing your lawn helps the birds. It’s because it allows your lawn plants to flower, even the grasses, which results in pollen and nectar to attract pollinators (many birds are insect eaters) and also seeds for the seed eating birds.
• Say no to the weedkillers. Weeds are mostly wildflowers, many of which are essential partner plants for our pollinators. Not just for pollen and nectar but also as larval food for many of our precious butterflies and moths. Plants are the base layer of the food chain. 
• Remember that most insects are friends and not foes. Those that do cause an issue are also food for garden wildlife. If you can learn to live and let live you will allow the natural balance in your garden to restore and the natural predators like the birds will keep your garden clear of the creatures that bug you.
• Cherish the caterpillars! A healthy nest of blue tits needs a thousand caterpillars a day to feed the chicks. 

Protecting songbirds

All creatures are a meal for something and our garden songbirds are no different. Natural predators like hawks and owls and even snakes will take a bird to sustain their own nest and offspring. There’s not much you can do about that and really you shouldn’t interfere. But there are other songbird predators that we cherish and that share our homes and gardens; our pets.

Unfortunately, sometimes our pets can kill garden birds and it is something that is very difficult to address. Hunting is a natural behaviour that is inbuilt to cats, dogs and other creatures. But even just the presence of a predator can upset the natural balance resulting in abandoned nests, eggs and fledglings and even sometimes affecting how the birds feed.

Training your pet can help, as can reducing any unsupervised time in nature. For cats you can simply keep them in at night, or even at dusk and dawn (peak songbird activity) in the breeding season (March to August), dogs can be tethered on a walk to prevent them chasing wild creatures or damaging/trampling a ground nest. With somewhere in the region of 12 million pet cats in the UK, even if they aren’t all good at hunting, you can see the problem. 

Cats can wear an anti-hunting collar or even a bell to alert birds to their presence. 

Feed your cat high protein food and keep them fit and healthy.

Play with your cat and exhaust its prey drive with a fishing pole toy. This allows them to exercise their prey drive and hunting skills in a controlled way away from the songbirds and other wildlife outside.

Keep your bird feeders and water baths clean and free of debris. Don’t allow water or bird food to go stale. Wash thoroughly to prevent the risk of diseases.

For more information about songbird survival visit the songbird survival website here.