>After purchasing a home in October, and learning of the NWF's "backyard
>wildlife habitat program" and WDFW's similar program, I started
>"birdscaping" my backyard. I am wondering if there is a local
>internet/e-mail source that discusses local habitats & their successes &
>failures? I have purchased several books on plantings for birds, but I
>have also picked up some dialog on planting native species only.

Do please try to stick with native plants. They support many more species
than exotics by the time you count insects (which are probably more
important to birds than berries on the whole), and they won't run amok and
escape cultivation to destroy healthy habitat. I don't think I've found a
'gardening for birds' book yet that doesn't recommend english holly, which
is turning into a disaster for the local forests.

> I am
>looking for a place that discusses water features, feeders & nesting
>boxes (placement, etc.), and plants. I understand that Rainier Audubon
>sponsors a backyard wildlife sanctuary tour in June?

I've been running a web site and mailing list for gardening with natives
for wildlife for over a year. Most of the focus has been on native plants
so far (and there are some very knowlegable native plant people on the
list), but birders, butterfliers, even sluggers are more than welcome to
help broaden the discussions. I's a low traffic list that goes along in
fits and starts, so if you subscribe and don't see any traffic, just post
something to wake us up :-) The web site has a fairly extensive
bibliography and list of nurseries which sell natives for the area I have
resources to cover (BC, WA and OR, wet side of the mountains). Also a few
links to other places of interest, though I'm behind again on that as with
so many other things.

Instructions for subscribing to the email list, and back archives (updated
irregularly) can be found at:

http://chemwww.chem.washington.edu/natives/pnw-natives-archives/

The top level of the site is:

http://chemwww.chem.washington.edu/natives/

Everything should be Lynx accessible.

Volunteers to write stuff up for the site, such as lists of birds one can
expect to attract under various circumstances, are always welcome, (hint
hint.)

My own toddler-age wildlife garden still isn't attracting much in the way
of new-to-the-yard birds, but just in the last few weeks I've seen about 7
different bee species and 4 or 5 kinds of wasps. I hope once the trees
grow into real trees (douglas hawthorn, bitter cherry, and shore pine so
far) a few more birds will come as well. But even what I have so far is
much more fun to look at than lawn!


Allyn Weaks
allyn at cornetto.chem.washington.edu aka allyn at u.washington.edu
Pacific Northwest Native Wildlife Gardening:
http://chemwww.chem.washington.edu/natives/