Attracting Birds to the Garden

[milster]

Not sure if this is in the right place, please move if need be

We're looking to plant some plants/shrubs and maybe a small tree or two in the back garden, to hopefully start attracting some more wildlife/birds. My wife wants some sort of cherry blossom but like I say needs to be pretty small (6-8ft when mature). So what do you guys recommend? We have had a bit of a look around but would like to know what sort of stuff works well

p.s. also after a wall climber or two for a north facing wall

Not sure if I've confused this forum with the gardeners one

Oh, and any other tips you may have

Thank you.

 

[u8myufo]

It would help Gary if you could post a pic of your garden, no good people suggesting things that would not suite the area you have to work with. There are lots of small shrubs and trees that will be good for the birds especially when they bear fruit. Waiting for a Cherry to mature will take a while unless you pay for having a more mature one planted which will not be cheap. I have small areas dedicated to things like Teasel etc. I also have Stinging Nettles and other small plants that will attract the bugs and other creepy crawlies, bird food is not just not about stuff we put in feeders Have you thought about a small bog garden? I did one last year and it is well used for bathing and feeding, not sure if you have the room for one but worth a thought. You have a pretty good climate down your way so growing stuff should not pose too big a problem. Visit your local garden centre and ask for advice on planting if you are not too sure.

 

[artyman]

Also think about where you place them in relation to where you want to shoot from as well.

 

[milster]

Cheers guys, not going out in this weather to take pictures so I've done a liitle drawing. As you can see it's not really my thing Just noticed this picture has a watermark on it, ignore that, I was having a play the other day, didn't realise it would watermark everything

Anyway, that's pretty much the lay out of our garden at the moment.
The garden is 30ft x 30ft (10m x 10m if you prefer ) We're in a semi with about a 20ft or so gap in between buildings so although the garden is north-ish facing we still get a fair bit of sun most of the day. The wife has a fair bit of stuff planted in the bedding area (4ft x 30ft) lavenders,heathers and ornamental grasses also has bamboo at the back which will grow fairly big to cover the fence at the back so hopefully that will provide cover for any visitors if nothing else. Not sure if any of that will be any good but she only planted it last year or so, so we won't really be replacing any of that for the moment.

What we're really looking at for now is to be planting stuff down both side walls really, creepers/shrubs (my wife has a clematis as a choice?) and like I say maybe a small tree or two. We've got a little bit of room in the bedding area for a couple of things. It's a more of a long term project as the kids are still pretty young so we don't want to be taking over too much of their play space either.

Not sure if this is any help

Thanks, Gary.