Sign up to win bird habitat plants
Creating more habitat for birds is something every one of us can do
We can all feel the weather warming at the moment and can see many plants coming into flower early. Birds are out and about looking for nests or even producing young.
At the same time we're hearing about bird flu arriving in Australia and wondering what it means for our avian neighbours. It can seem a bit overwhelming.
That's why Growing Illawarra Natives and The Illawarra Flame are teaming up to boost backyard bird habitat. Growing Illawarra Natives are giving away four native habitat plant packs. To have a chance to win, simply sign up as a Friend of the Flame (free or $5 a month) before Monday, September 13.
If you're already a subscriber, don't worry, your name is already in the draw!
Why a plant giveaway? It's a scary time now with bird flu on our doorstep and much uncertainty about its impacts locally. And while our options to manage the impacts of bird flu directly are limited, we can help reduce other pressures on bird populations.
Creating more habitat for birds is something that every one of us can do. Whether it's adding more local native plants to your garden, adding a few plants to a common area in a multi-dwelling development, growing them on the balcony or yard of your rental, or asking your school, childcare or shopping centre to add local plants, restoring habitat for fauna is one of the most important actions we can take.
These actions are their own reward as I can attest after 15 years of habitat gardening.
Each plant pack will include prickly orange thorn shrubs (Pittosporum multiflorum), which make great habitat for smaller birds such as wrens and thornbills. These small birds need places to hide from larger and more aggressive birds such as the noisy miners that dominate many urban spaces, so providing some dense and prickly shrubbery fits the bill.
Even a verge can be a good place to add habitat, though you may need to engage with your council first and work to guidelines they have in place. I talked with Ralph Stadus from the Illawarra Birders who told me about his street tree experience in Minnamurra.
Ralph has had a (non-local) paperbark (Melaleuca) tree on his verge for many years and said it was easy enough to balance habitat value with the overhead powerlines.
"Some careful pruning in early years to shape the tree into a flat fan shape and retaining all the lower branches has made it nice and dense,'' Ralph says.
''As a result, a number of small birds love it both for its flowers and to pick insects off it. Regular visitors are our family of superb fairy-wrens, New Holland honeyeaters and occasional yellow thornbills."
In case you need further incentive, the beautiful photographs below provided by Ewan Auld and Keith Horton show some of the birds that will benefit if we all grow more local native plants across the Illawarra.
To enter the competition, sign up to be a Friend of the Flame here.
