Homegrown Habitat guide to the native plants that will help the birds in your yard this spring (and beyond)

Yellow-rumped Warblers are frequent visitors to yards and gardens in spring. Photo by Matthew Bell/CT Audubon.

It’s relatively easy to make your yard and surrounding property better for birds. Small changes over time add up to big improvements. And what’s good for birds tends to be good for bees, butterflies, moths and other kinds of insects.

Now that it’s spring, Sarah Middeleer, who writes Connecticut Audubon’s Homegrown Habitat feature, has picked two trees, two shrubs, and two perennials for you to consider planting.

“One in each group is a spring bloomer,” she said, “and the other one has attractive features later in the season (but the shrubs and trees actually have three- to four-season interest).”

Starting in the fall of 2023, Sarah has written once a month about Connecticut’s native plants and their benefits. The six she mentions here are a good place to start but the others are worthwhile too.

You can find Homegrown Habitat here. Questions? Write to Sarah at homegrown@ctaudubon.org.

Red columbine. Photo by David J. Stang – source: David Stang. First published at ZipcodeZoo.com, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=60999928

Perennials

Eastern Red Columbine
Aquilegia canadensis
You can join the welcome party that columbine throws for the beloved Ruby-throated Hummingbirds: just as the tiny migrants return from their winter sojourn in Central America, columbine unfurls its brilliant red and yellow tubular petals full of sweet nectar.

Columbine will grow in shade and sun and is very drought tolerant. It is particularly suited to limestone outcrops but accepts many soil types as long as they are well drained. A friend tells me that a construction site she knows of—where much of the existing vegetation was removed—is host to a columbine bravely holding its own against the backhoes, having sprouted between two stone steps.

Patio containers (without a saucer underneath), woodland edges, rock gardens, and the margins of stone or gravel paths are among the many garden locations suitable for columbine.

Smooth Aster
Symphyotrichum laeve
The nectar of goldenrods and asters nourishes migrating butterflies such as painted ladies and monarchs, and their pollen feeds a great number of native bees. Once their colorful flowers have faded, birds and rodents rely on the resulting seeds. The well-fed rodents then help to nourish raptors through the winter. Many beneficial insects establish winter homes inside the left-over stems (so try to leave them uncut despite the urge to complete a ‘fall clean-up’).

With upright growth habit and arching stems, smooth aster grows 18 inches to three feet high. Violet and yellow flowers appear from late summer through fall. It takes full sun to part shade in moist or dry soils. This aster is appropriate for the perennial border.

Shrubs

Highbush Blueberry
Vaccinium corymbosum
Highbush blueberry, native throughout Eastern North America, makes an excellent substitute for the non-native burning bush (Euonymus alatus), a thug sold by garden centers because customers love its scarlet fall color. Burning bush has invaded our woodlands and other natural areas, crowding out native plants that provide valuable food for wildlife. Highbush blueberry grows with a habit and texture similar to burning bush but offers marvelous wildlife habitat value.

Besides its fruit, which attracts many mammals and songbirds such as Gray Catbirds, Scarlet Tanagers, and thrushes, among others, highbush blueberry leaves are enjoyed by more than 200 moth and butterfly caterpillars. Caterpillars are prime nestling fare and are therefore critical to maintaining healthy songbird populations.

Although blueberry is amenable to part shade, it will fruit most prolifically and display its best fall color in full sun. Given space, highbush blueberry will grow in an upright, rounded shape and may develop a vase shape over time.

Highbush blueberry is highly adaptable to different conditions, with the caveats that it needs acidic soils (pH 4.5-5) and good drainage. In the wild it is often found in wet areas but also, confusingly, on rocky hillsides.

Red Chokeberry
Aronia arbutifolia
Red chokeberry can serve as a wonderful replacement for the highly invasive burning bush (Euonymus alatus). Red chokeberry adds the benefit of scarlet fruit along with the brilliant leaf color—not to mention its much higher value to wildlife.

Birds relish the chokeberry fruits. Chokeberries may attract crows and jays, waxwings, vireos, orioles, thrushes, sparrows, wood warblers, woodpeckers, mockingbirds, and thrashers. The chokeberries are host plants to several moths and hairstreak butterflies, whose larvae help support songbird nestlings.

Red chokeberry and its relative, black chokeberry, are rather refined and neat in appearance, with upright, distinct branching patterns. They have similar mature sizes; red grows 5-12 feet high by 4-8 feet wide, and black grows 3-10 feet high by 3-6 feet wide. Both grow higher than wide, which makes them adaptable to many locations in smaller gardens. Red has dark reddish-brown stems, which set off the white flowers in spring and offer winter interest.

Serviceberry is being planted as part of a forestry management project at Deer Pond Farm.

Trees

Serviceberry
Amelanchier spp
Serviceberries adorn themselves in clouds of delicate white flowers in April, before their leaves emerge. But these small trees continue to present new delights throughout the year.

Birds may nest or seek cover in them and will devour the fruit. Orioles, cardinals, thrushes, catbirds, titmice, woodpeckers, waxwings, and robins are among the many birds that thrive on them.

Serviceberries are suitable for woodland or lawn edges, hedgerows, near streams or ponds, and as specimen plantings. They are an excellent choice for pollinator gardens and children’s gardens. Given their smaller size, they can safely be planted relatively close to the house — say, near a patio or front walk. Serviceberries are especially effective against a backdrop of evergreens, where their white flowers, orange fall leaves, and pale-gray trunks stand out.

Hornbeam
Carpinus caroliniana
Like several other trees in the birch family, hornbeam produces catkins in early spring as the leaves emerge. Fruits that develop inside the catkins are tiny winged nuts held in small clusters that blend in with the foliage. Many birds, including finches and Wild Turkey, favor the hornbeam nutlets. Seed-eating fall migrants, as well as overwintering songbirds, will be glad to find them.

Besides offering excellent cover and shelter, hornbeam hosts over 70 species of moths and butterflies, including the eastern tiger swallowtail and red-spotted purple butterflies, and the walnut sphinx moth. All of these lepidoptera lay eggs on the tree, from which caterpillars emerge.

Another reminder: the ability of a plant to provide plenty of caterpillars makes it invaluable to our songbirds, which rely on thousands of larvae to feed their young each spring. (As entomologist, author, and conservationist Doug Tallamy says, without caterpillars we have no birds.) In addition, the hornbeam seeds, wood, and bark are all food sources for ducks, warblers, rabbits, squirrels, foxes, and beavers.

Hornbeam would make a fine patio tree, where you could easily keep an eye on its watering needs. Also consider it for rain gardens, “ecotones” (transition zones between a wooded area and lawn or meadow), woodland understory plantings, and other locations.

Don’t forget to scroll through the rest of Homegrown Habitat here. Write to Sarah at homegrown@ctaudubon.org.