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Now that the growing season is here, are you thinking about making your yard into a wildlife habitat? This is one of the greatest ideas to come along in many years. Backyard wildlife sanctuaries are a compromise between humans' needs and nature's needs: You get to live in your house, but rather than driving all the natural wildlife away by planting "the green desert" (grass), killing weeds, and growing exotic shrubs, you can help the animals and birds that were displaced when your house was built, by creating a place for them to live and encouraging them to co-exist with you.

Find out what plants are native to your area and plant them. Plant a lot of them. You cannot over-plant. You'll find that you don't have to constantly coax them to grow, the way you do grass and non-native plant species. They are natural to this climate and they will grow all by themselves. It's fun to watch them. I'm always surprised by how healthy and strong the natives are, compared with, for instance, those sickly roses with black spots that I've been spraying and fussing over for years.

Allow a portion of your yard to "go natural." Let the weeds grow. When you trim bushes and trees, or rake up leaves, toss the branches and leaves into this area to create a "brush pile." There are certain bird species that love brush piles, such as wrens, towhees, and sparrows. Once you have a good brush pile established, it's almost guaranteed that every time you turn your binoculars towards it, you will see a little bird flitting in and out among the sticks.

Put out a bird-bath or other water feature. Birds love water! Place the bath near a tree or shrub, so that wet birds can fly quickly into it, to shake off and preen. If you are a new bird-bath owner, you'll probably notice two things right away: One, bathing stimulates a bird to poop, so your bath will frequently have poop in it; and two, slime and algae grow in the bath. The solution to both of these is to keep the bath clean. I refill my bird-bath with clean water every morning on my way out to the car, and I clean it once a week. Neither of these chores is too time-consuming and the time they take me is definitely worth the trouble, for the reward of having birds splashing and playing in the water. Robins and chickadees seem to particularly love the water in my yard.

If you want to add feeders to your wildlife sanctuary, that's up to you. The birds won't need them once you've filled your yard with native plants, a brush pile, and a water feature. Living in harmony with nature and wildlife is one of the simple joys of life, and we are finally learning how to do this even if we live in an urban area.

Australian Birds here