(12/12) Over the years, I have evolved from just wanting my garden to be "pretty", to working to create a true habitat where many species of wildlife can find their "forever" home. By this, I am speaking of song birds, butterflies, bees and many species of beneficial insects.

A habitat implies that this is a good year-round environment for all these different species. It is not just a temporary summer feeding spot. To me, creating desirable habitat includes building healthy soil, use of native plants, providing year round food and water and elimination of pesticides.

Building Healthy Soil

Healthy soil is critical to good plant growth. The measure of healthy soil is dependent on the number of microbes that live there. Microbes are microscopic beings that live in the soil. Their job is to convert any organic material into a form that is usable by the plant. The more microbes you have, the healthier your soil will be. The best way to get more microbes is to feed them — not buy them at the store. Compost is a huge contributor here, but even more important is the "roots in the ground" concept.

Plants are the only living things on earth that are able to take sunlight and change it into energy. That energy is actually a wide range of chemicals which become food for microbes. Latest research shows that living roots are far more efficient at releasing this food into the soil.

The more roots that are present in your soil, the greater your population of microbes will be, and the healthier your plants.

The simple application of this research is to use ground covering plants in place of traditional mulch.

Use of Native Plants

There is absolutely no doubt that native plants are far more desirable to our essential native wildlife than non-natives, simply because they have evolved together over the eons of years since our earth began. True native plants also tend to have deeper roots which are able to extend farther into the soil, working to eliminate compaction, and bringing up moisture and nutrients that shorter-rooted plants cannot access. This is the reason that established native plants will usually survive when a non-native import will perish without human intervention.

Most importantly, native bees which are essential for human survival on earth (whether we are aware or not), recognize the native plant as food where they will often ignore the non-native.

Native bees are known to nest either in bare soil, or in hollow stems. It has been my observation that almost every native plant I grow seems to have hollow stems. As part of my winter habitat routine, I cut those plants back, (saving the yet uneaten seed heads in a container for the songbirds to find), but leave at least a foot of the stem stand as a nesting site for bees.

Almost all native shrubs, and many trees produce berries or fruit of some kind that feed our songbirds. In addition, many perennials produce seed heads for winter feeding.

Provide Year Round Food and Water

The fruit, berries, and seed heads offered by native shrubs, trees and perennials offer food through the winter. Keeping bird baths filled in winter months is also crucial for many birds’ survival. Probably most important for providing winter habitat, is allowing the leaves to stay where they fall in the garden beds. Beneficial insects lay eggs and find warmth and protection in the leaves all winter, and the songbirds sustain themselves from feeding on those insects and their eggs that they find while foraging through the leaf litter.

Providing bird feeders throughout the winter months is appreciated by the birds, but remember they need the protein from insects and access to water even more.

Elimination of Pesticides

For the lazy and uninformed gardener, pesticides are a wonderful thing. Holes in the leaves? Just grab the poison and spray away! Even pesticides which say "approved for organic gardens" are designed to kill. They may be safer for you, the gardener, but not for the bee or butterfly they happen to land on. I, personally, am not interested in touching them or breathing in their vapor.

The idea of a perfectly manicured garden with several feet of dark mulch between each plant has become very passe among in-touch gardeners today. Today’s garden is lush with plants and groundcovers with very little unplanted soil visible. It is alive with beautiful songbirds, buzzing bees, and fluttering butterflies. There is a multitude of insect life happening which the gardener must look very closely to see, but, for the most part, these are what I like to refer to as the "good guys". When you offer the habitat I have been describing, the "good guys" will come. When you eliminate the use of pesticides, you will find that the "good guys" will eliminate the "bad guys" (those invasive pests that eat and destroy your garden plants).

I have been gardening and observing in my suburban garden for thirty-five years. I follow the guidelines I have described here. I do not use pesticides EVER on my garden plants or turf grass. It is very rare that I see disease, and difficult to remember the last time my plants suffered from a pest invasion.

Read other articles on ecological gardening & native plants

Read other winter related gardening articles