A guide for creating a bird-friendly garden

Late winter is a good time to make plans to enhance your garden with plants that attract birds all year long.

It takes more than feeders, birdhouses and a birdbath along with some flowers for a truly bird-friendly garden. Birds need a complete habitat that includes food, shelter, nesting areas and perching spots.

A good bird garden tends to have more of a natural look to it. This is my preferred gardening style. I also enjoy seeing birds throughout the year. Use natural areas that have different vertical levels as a guide for your garden, each attracting and providing something important to different bird species.

Some birds prefer the canopy of tall trees while other birds perch in understory trees and shrubs. Try to create as many of these levels as possible to make a bird refuge to attract a larger variety of birds. Even open areas of soil can be beneficial by providing an area for birds to take a dust bath. People living in apartments or other small, urban spaces can also attract birds to balconies or windowsills with a water source like a shallow dish of water or habitat like a plant in a pot or window box.

Select plants that provide food for birds at different times of year. Fruits of different plants ripen in different seasons. For example, serviceberries provide spring-ripening fruit, red-twig dogwood provide fruit in summer, and hawthorns and crabapples provide fruit in fall and winter.

Perennials such as purple coneflower and grasses such as a prairie dropseed provide seeds as a food source. Sunflowers are quick-growing annual flowers that produce seeds that are attractive to birds. Nectar-producing plants such as penstemon, Mexican bush sage, and columbine are attractive to hummingbirds.

Include a mix of evergreens in your planting to provide year-round shelter for birds. When possible, leave some dead branches on living trees to provide zones for the birds to perch on. Prune any dead branches that are safety hazards.

If you feed birds in your garden or on your balcony, try to stop your dog from eating fallen birdseed. The birdseed alone is probably not going to cause any problems unless a dog eats enough to affect its intestines. If a dog develops a large amount of gas in the stomach from the seeds fermenting, it can cause the stomach to bloat, which can lead to a condition in which the stomach twists on itself. This is a life-threatening condition that requires immediate emergency veterinary attention. Most dogs can pass small amounts of ingested bird seed.

Another area of concern is that dogs may eat bird droppings that may contain salmonella bacteria along with the birdseed. Salmonella can cause severe digestive upset with lots of vomiting and diarrhea that can be fatal in very young or old dogs. The salmonella bacteria can also be passed on to you. My dachshunds gorge themselves on seed on the ground if left unsupervised. This has resulted in an occasional bout of diarrhea, which is unpleasant to deal with.

I did some research as to whether it is OK to continue feeding birds considering the recent outbreak of bird flu. The USDA does not specifically recommend removing backyard feeders to prevent avian flu unless you also take care of poultry, as chickens and hens are more susceptible to the flu. Check with your local bird expert for recommendations that are specific to your garden.

• Tim Johnson is director of horticulture at Chicago Botanic Garden, chicagobotanic.org.