Making A Bird-Friendly Place

Last Saturday I was talking with two friends who are building a vacation home community on a tract of land near Dhaka. Being avid nature lovers, they have planted a variety of trees and are working to make their place as eco-friendly as possible.

At one point our conversation turned to birds. “What should we plant and how should we landscape to maximize birds at our place?” they asked.

I could have advised them on how to find birds, but this query needed expert help so we turned to our pre-eminent birder Enam Ul Haque.

“The first thing is to decide what birds you want to attract. For example, crows and shaliks (starling) often feed off waste and are probably undesirable,” Enam said. “To attract the more desirable birds you will need to plant the proper trees and wait for them to grow.”

Birds will come when there is food and where there are not too many people, he said. So it is important to set aside some land where trees can be planted and can be left alone without human presence. There may be a path through it, but it should not be busy with people, Enam elaborated. A mix of plants is best for attracting a variety of birds.

Enam pointed out that wild shrubs attract many birds, especially smaller ones. Since they are not sold in nurseries, one can uproot some from the roadside or fields and bring them for replanting. These include akond (crown flower), bhat (harlequin glorybower), dhutura (wild trumpet), dhol kolmi (pink morning glory) and other wild plants.

Trees with large flowers attract a variety of birds. These include shimul (silk cotton),  polash (flame of forest), madar (coral flower) and mohua (honey tree) trees. Trees such as botol-brush (bottlebrush) and kolke-phul (yellow oleander) are magnets for flowerpeckers, sunbirds, leafbirds, white-eye, etc.

Tall grass attracts birds such as munias, prinias, cisticolas and warblers. A flock of munias looks beautiful playing and feeding in tall grass. Varieties of tall grass include kash (wild sugarcane), kaishha (lesser bulrush), hogla (bulrush), etc. They may be brought from the fields. Enam mentioned another way of growing grass: a mosaic of well-known grains like dhan, kaun and bhuro can be grown by throwing a handful of seeds, purchased from a pet bird store, in a grassy field in monsoon.

Next we discussed ponds, lakes and puddles for attracting birds. By the waterside, Enam suggested planting trees in tiers. The front tier, closest to water, can be populated with wild plants of low height. The next tier can be medium trees and large full-size trees can round out the back tier. It goes without saying that native, bird-friendly trees should be used. Trees such as hijol, borun and koroch are beautiful and thrive in or near water.

On the water, different birds have different agendas. Wild ducks would be wonderful but ducks are extremely sensitive to human presence. Therefore they prefer undisturbed water bodies. Other water birds are more tolerant of human presence. To make a home for them one can grow a variety of aqueous plants such as shapla (water lily), poddo (lotus), kochuripana (water hyacinth) and chandmala (snowflake) where waterhens, jacanas, little grebes and moorhens can feed and nest.

If you have land in rural or semi-rural areas (including Purbachol and Bashundhara) please consider these pointers. Although Bangladesh is rich in birdlife, habitat destruction looms as the greatest threat to our birds. So every little step to make one's land friendlier to birds will help.

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