How to Attract More Birds to Your Yard: Ask the Expert

This is part of a series with Perfect Earth Project, a nonprofit dedicated to toxic-free, ecological gardening, on how you can be more sustainable in your landscapes at home.  

How beautiful the blossoms are—emblems of the resilience of life.
The birds approach eagerly. 
—Louise Glück from “Primavera” 

It’s happening! With a burst of warm weather all the flowering trees seemed to have bloomed at once here in the Northeast, which happened to coincide with the arrival of spring migration. This fledgling birder couldn’t be happier. I’m thrilled to have already spotted Black-and-white, Palm, and Pine Warblers, a Blue-headed Vireo, and my first Orchard Oriole! I can’t wait for the Bobolinks to return to a local grassy meadow in a few weeks. And I am hoping that this is the season I’ll see my first Painted Bunting. Fingers crossed.   

One way we can all see more birds and help reverse the increasing population declines caused by habitat loss and pesticide use is to adjust how we garden and care for our yards. I spoke with John Fitzpatrick, the director emeritus of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and one of the founders of eBird, to learn more about what we can do. Fascinated with birds since he first identified an American Redstart while home sick from school when he was just five years old, Fitzpatrick shares how understanding the intricate relationship between birds and plants helps us provide them with what they need. Here are his recommendations.  

Feed birds naturally and avoid all pesticides.  

Above: Spring beauties (Claytonia virginica) is just one kind of Northeastern wildflower that will pop up in the lawn in the spring if you don’t treat it with herbicides. Not only do they make the grass more beautiful, but they also add to its diversity, which benefits birds. Photograph courtesy of Perfect Earth Project.

If you love birds, you have to love insects, too. A whopping 98 percent of terrestrial birds feed their young insects. When you spray pesticides on your plants, you kill insects—all of them, not just the ones you’re targeting. And when you kill insects, you are depleting the vital food supply of birds, which means fewer birds. Grow the beautiful native plants that birds have evolved alongside and welcome the insects that come to nibble on them. At Perfect Earth Project we say, “Plant 2/3 for the birds,”