INSTEAD, THESE PLANTS WILL ATTRACT BIRDS TO YOUR BACKYARD
EXPERTS John Rowden and Marcos Trinidad said it doesn’t make sense to create a specific must-have list, since the best plants for local birds depend on your area. Here’s a sampling of plants they grow in their yards. (Trinidad lives in northeast L.A., Rowden in Venice.)
If you have the space, live oak trees are habitat stars, providing food, shelter and nesting materials for a wide variety of insects and wildlife.
Buckwheats are pollinator magnets, attracting all kinds of native bees, moths and butterflies as well as birds. The CalScape database lists more than 50 varieties.
There are more than 100 varieties of shrubs like ceanothus, also known as California lilac, with its luscious clusters of blue, purple or white blooms, and red-limbed manzanita, which can grow as a groundcover, tall bush or small tree with sweet clusters of dew drop type flowers. Other shrubs such as currant, toyon, coffeeberry and lemonade berry have lots of flowers in the spring and colorful berries in the late summer and fall. Note that native shrubs can get very tall and wide, “but there’s no reason you can’t prune a native plant if you have limited space,” Trinidad said.
California fuchsia, with its brilliant red blooms, is a hummingbird magnet and grows well in pots, Rowden said. Other colorful options include sticky monkey flower ,a shrub with sticky leaves and deep yellow blooms, and the many varieties of penstemons with their colorful, deep-throated flowers.
Sages and salvias are also good choices. There are dozens of sage varieties, some suited for shade, others for full sun, and they provide not only beautiful blooms and seed heads but an intoxicating fragrance. Just a little hummingbird sage or Cleveland sage, for instance, could perfume a balcony.
Grasses, such as purple needle grass or blue-eyed grass, can add texture and movement to your garden while providing seeds, shelter for insects and a good place for birds to forage.