Habitat Gardening

Attracting native animals to your garden can add extra colour and interest. These animals can assist with pest control and the pollination of many plants. By thinking of our gardens as habitat, we can provide food, water, shelter and even places to nest.

 

BIRDS

Birds are some of the most conspicuous visitors to our gardens. They manage pest insects that can have an impact on food crops and ornamental plants. A habitat which will attract birds to a native garden needs to include shelter, food and water.

Trees with hollows or nest boxes provide important shelter for birds, like parrots and owls. Smaller birds can also nest in prickly plants and even ground ferns in your garden.

A reliable water source in the shade, through summer months, will attract birds to your garden and provide relief from summer heat. A diversity of plants that flower, fruit and seed at different times helps to extend the nectar cycle by providing feeding sites for many months of the year. Avoid placing excess seed, bread or scraps in artificial feeders: these can create dependent birds and also create a possible nuisance. Importantly, it also creates a risk of making birds ill if fed inappropriate foods.

Small birds, such as Silvereyes, Fairy Wrens, Robins, Fantails and Thornbills, forage on insects at ground level in the garden. Allowing some tussocks of native grasses, such as Alpine Tussock (Poa sieberiana) and Weeping grass (Microleanea stipoides), can provide foods for seed-eating birds like Finches and Pigeons.

Honeyeaters, Wattlebirds and Spinebills drink the nectar of native flowers like Grevilleas, Correas, Banksia and many plants with bell shaped flowers.

 

Larger parrots enjoy feeding on woody seed cones from Hakeas and Sheoaks while large birds like Magpies, Kookaburras, Currawongs and Butcherbirds feed on larger insects and small lizards. Lyrebirds feed on insects, worms and spiders. Many of these animals lower in the food chain will be present if there are rocks or logs scattered through a garden.

 

 

BUTTERFLIES & OTHER POLLINATORS

Insects, such as bees and butterflies, play a vital role in the pollination of native plants. Without these insects, our local plants would never set seed or provide valuable food for native animals.

 

Diversity is the key to success for pollination.  Planting a range of plants from different plant families which have different colours and flowering times throughout the year may encourage useful insects to visit your yard or garden.

 

These insects use different plants on which to lay their eggs - on leaves, stems and roots. Some insects like native wasps can prey on other pest insects and act like nature’s pest controllers.

 

FROGS

 

What could be more interesting than watching tadpoles grow into frogs and then being serenaded by their calls at night?

Frogs also help control pests in your garden: they eat flies, mosquitoes, slugs, snails and even spiders.

 

In order to enjoy frogs in your garden, you will need to provide a pond with certain features, but you’ll also need to live near an existing frog population.

 

A frog pond can incorporate one or all of the requirements for each part of the frogs’ lifecycle:

 

• Damp bog zone for adult frogs.

• Shallow water zone for laying eggs.

• Deep zone of at least 30cm for tadpoles.

 

Your frog garden should also have:

• Soft, thick vegetation that droops into the water, for shelter and protection.

• Rocks, logs, bark and leaf litter.

• Mostly shade.

• Sloping sides to enable the frogs to crawl out.

• Been made from non-toxic materials (concrete ponds will need to be sealed and plastic ponds be made of food-grade plastic).

• Food plants for tadpoles (and they will eat them, so don’t put your prize waterlily in there).

 

Frog-friendly plants:

 

Tufting plants – Pale Rush (Juncus pallidus) or Black-anther Flax-lily (Dianella admixta).

 

Bog plants - Common Sedge (Carex tereticaulis), Knobby Clubrush (Ficinia nodosa), Common Rush (Juncus australis) and Austral Gypsywort (Lycopus australis).

 

Water plants – Common Nardoo (Marsilea drummondii), Purple Loosestrife (Lythrum salicaria), Tassel Sedge (Carex fascicularis) and Water Ribbons (Triglochin procerum).

 

MAMMALS

 

People have moved to the Kinglake region over the years because, amongst other things, they love the unique natural environment. Living in such a beautiful area also means that we live in close proximity to our unique native animals, such as wallabies, wombats, possums, echidnas and koalas.  We even have less common and threatened animals such as bandicoots, greater gliders and phascogales. Mature trees contain hollows which become shelter and breeding sites for many of these animals.

 

Sharing our space with mammals in particular can present some unique challenges as we struggle between the delight of spotting a cute little sugar glider and pulling our hair out when we discover a wombat has made a feast of our carefully tended garden. It’s all a question of give and take!

 

Food: If you would like to attract animals like possums or gliders to your garden, plant Wattles, Bottlebrush and Banksias. These plants encourage bird pollinators as well as insects, which will create a food source for microbats.  Alternatively, keeping wildlife out of vegetable gardens can be achieved by use of fencing and plastic guards.  Be careful to select netting which won’t entangle birds or bats - ideally netting that you cannot poke your finger through is best.

 

Water: A shaded water source, particularly in summer, will also attract wildlife to your garden.

 

SHELTER

Many of Australia’s unique animals have evolved to use tree-hollows.

Mature trees, whether living or dead, that contain hollows are necessary for shelter and breeding sites for micro-bats, possums and gliders.

Tree-hollows are formed by the action of fungi and/or termites, usually where the tree has suffered limb or trunk damage. Large tree-hollows can take many years to form, in some cases 150+ years. Even when a hollow branch or tree falls to the ground, the hollows will continue to be used by ground-dwelling animals.

You can attract mammals to your garden by providing a variety of different nest boxes, designed to suit the varying requirements of the different species. This is also a great strategy for luring possums away from nesting in your roof.

 

Why install nest boxes?

Many areas of bushland don’t contain enough natural tree-hollows for the wildlife that lives in the area.

Nesting boxes are a great way to survey secretive native animals in your local area.

Even where there are natural tree-hollows, nest-boxes can still be used and will help you see what animals live on your property.

If you install and maintain well-built nest-boxes, they’ll last for many years and will provide homes for many generations of the animals that use them.

 

Which animals of the Kinglake Ranges use nest-boxes?

Birds: Crimson Rosellas, King Parrots, Owlet Nightjars and White-throated Tree-creepers.

Mammals: Common & Mountain Brush-tailed Possums; Greater, Sugar, & Feathertail Gliders; Brush-tailed Phascogales, Ringtail Possums and Agile Antechinus.

Bats: Local micro-bats use hollows and nest-boxes.