Vines and Trees and Birds and Butterflies and Bees

Vines and Trees and Butterflies and Birds and Bees

The right combination of trees and vines can lead to lots of birds, butterflies and bees-beelieve or not. We’re developing such a combination over at the Freedom Park Bird and Butterfly Garden, corner of North Ave. and Candler Park Drive. When we decided on the site for the garden it happened to include four large White Oak trees (Quercus alba). Little did we realize how fortuitous this was, not being up to speed on the secret life of trees at the time. Since we’ve learned that the White Oak is a valuable food source for over 28 species of birds, including Blue Jays, American Crows, Red-headed Woodpeckers, Tufted Titmice and White -breasted Nuthatches, all of which have been seen or heard at the garden. The trees provide a huge benefit to wildlife populations because of their acorns, which are larger and sweeter than other oaks such as the red oak. In fact, including birds, 180 wildlife species prefer these acorns (www.Copeland.udel.edu). The White Oak can live for over 500 years and grows to 100 feet tall and is native to America.

Now, the White Oaks obviously don’t need any help to attract wildlife, but overachievers that we are, we decided to give them some help anyway-and that’s where the vines come in. We’ve gone ahead and planted a native vine by each of three of the trees, and each of these vines attracts birds and butterflies and bees! And here they are:

Passion Flower (Passiflora incarnata) is a host plant for the bright orange Gulf Fritillary, the Variegated Fritillary, and Zebra Butterflies. The size and structure of flowers of this plant is optimized for pollination by hummingbirds, bumble bees and wasps. The vine, with its exotic white and purple flowers can grow to 20 feet.

Climbing hydrangea (Decumaria barbara ) is an attractive deciduous vine with lace-cap like clusters of large white flowers in midsummer. This plant, too, is attractive to bees, butterflies and/or birds. Its also a favorite of deer though we’re not really expecting any. The vine can grow up to 40 feet high.

Crossvine on White Oak
Crossvine (Bignonia capreolata) is native to southeastern North America where it occurs widely in uplands, lowlands, forests, and clearings. The outside of the typical crossvine flower is red to brownish-orange, the inside yellow. It’s a hummingbird favorite, is drought tolerant and will grow to 40 feet.

So take a peek over at the garden, which, by the way, is a joint project of
Atlanta Audubon and the DeKalb Master Gardener Association.

Carol Vanderschaaf
Co-coordinator

Freedom Park Bird and Butterfly Garden Summer/Fall, Almost Winter Update 12-01-09

　
The garden stands alone! The garden made it through this summer and fall without much help from me. I’ll explain but first, apologies for this late and abbreviated update. Please accept my cupful of excuses and my explanation: on June 18, the day after the last update, I tripped while out walking and broke my kneecap. My own fault, I confess. I was busy looking towards a beautiful St. John’s Wort hoping to see some wildlife fluttering among the yellow blooms when an uneven pavement got me. Since that time I’ve been pretty such in recovery mode and was not able to get over to the garden myself until recently.

Thanks! In the meantime MANY THANKS to the volunteers who helped the garden get by: Tom Painter, who kept the birdbath full, Dorothy Dabbs, who watered the garden in its time of need, Lauren Sandoval, who watered our drooping new trees, Cecilia Marrero, who took photo’s of a still unidentified plant (we know its native since Meta Larson, who donated the plant, bought it at the Native Plant Garden at Georgia Perimeter College), and to Tom Painter, again, Martha Treadwell Justice and Diana Shellack who helped clean up the garden on a recent work day.

December 1 at the garden: The garden is looking pretty good! Even at this time of year. Zinnias are still in bloom The seed pods on the Wild Sienna are almost ready to be picked. The Stokes’ Asters, Blueberry plants, Florida Anise, Waxmyrtle, Crossvine, Celandine Poppy, Cumberland Rosemary, Passionflower, Thrift and Hawkweed continue to sport their greenery. The Eastern Red Cedar has grown about a foot. The bird bath is brimming with water thanks to all the recent rain-and Tom Painter. There are no more berries on the American Beautyberry nor any seed heads on the Purple Coneflowers-hopefully the birds made a meal of these.

So, all in all, the garden made it through the season without much help, as it is meant to do. For this, thanks to Phil Edwards, garden co-coordinator, and the DeKalb Master Gardeners’ Association who planned and planted the garden and, without whom, the garden would have never come to be.

Things on hold: Many things have been on hold for the last few months and for this I point the finger of blame at my knee-ouch! Still to be accomplished: a Power Point presentation, a pathway through the garden, a grant application and completion of markers for all the plants. Also we weren't able to connect with Mary Lin School students this year, very disappointing, but wait til next year! Again, I wasn't able to coordinate things in time.

Help re email addresses: To add insult to knee injury, my computer crashed in early September so I’ve lost some of the Update email addresses. So if you know anybody who might be interested in receiving the Update please send me their email address. Anyone not wishing to receive Updates, please hit reply/send.

Soapbox: Yes, even with a broken knee cap I can perch upon it! Just want to add a link to the "Save Jekyll Island" site - www.savejekyllisland.org - there's a "Keep Jekyll Affordable" petition there if you'd like to sign it. The possible commercial development of Jekyll is scary and, as far as I'm concerned, just a foot in the door for developers to move on to other parts of the lovely Georgia coast. And if they do, we'll lose all that beauty and all those birds and become a replica of my home state, New Jersey (much as I love it). So here’s a chance to keep an established native plant wildlife habitat in place.

Well, I'm stepping off my soapbox-cautiously.

Thanks for listening and

HAPPY HOLIDAYS
　
Carol Vanderschaaf
Co-coordinator
Cvanderschaaf@bellsouth.net

Easy-to-grow natives

Native plants for birds and/or butterflies:
Black-eyed Susan
Purple Coneflower
Lantana
Golden Fleece Goldenrod
Autumn Sage
Virginia Creeper
Cardinal Flower
Crossvine

Native plants for birds:
American Beautyberry
Pokeweed
Blueberry
Yellow root

Native plants for butterflies:
Butterfly Weed (not Bush), Fennel
Joe Pye Weed
St. John’s Wort
Milkweed
Passionflower