Ann Litrel

Winter Snapshots

5 Elements of a Certified Wildlife Habitat

ART AND TEXT BY ANN LITREL

In 2021, more than 140 Eagle Watch residents joined efforts to certify their yards and create Cherokee County’s first certified wildlife habitat community through the National Wildlife Federation.

What makes a yard a wildlife habitat? To be certified, homeowners work through a checklist of five basics needed to help wildlife in a suburban yard, including food sources, cover and water. Here are a few winter snapshots from my yard that illustrate the elements of a certified wildlife habitat:

1. Food Sources Goldfinches and sparrows flit through the delicate stems and dried leaves of native coneflowers and sunflowers in my back garden, feasting on plump seed heads. Squirrels and blue jays chatter nearby, stripping pine seeds from the cones under my pine trees, now that the acorns mostly are gone.

2. Water Sources A pair of resident chickadees alights on the edge of my small, backyard pond for a sip of water. A fox from the woods across the street appears ghostlike in the early morning, as his usual source of water has frozen solid. Next door, my neighbor keeps a birdbath with a little heater to keep her song birds happy when temperatures dip below freezing. In the quiet, I can hear their songs some days.

3. Places for Cover Cardinals fluff

their feathers against the cold in the branches of Carolina hemlocks at the corner of my house. There, they hide from the sharp eyes of the hawk, who patrols overhead. A brush pile at the edge of the yard harbors countless small creatures, from insects to salamanders. The liquid song of the Carolina wren tells me he has found this cache — for him, a breakfast buffet of bugs. At the bottom of my pond, waterlogged leaves hide the three bronze frogs who have made their home there. During winter, their heart and respiratory rates slow, but, come spring, they will hop back up on the rocks to bask in the sun.

4. Places to Raise Young Dense shrubbery at the front of my house provides a prime nesting spot for the summer catbirds (who like to be close to the blueberries). Several beds of native flowers and grasses shelter the young of butterflies and moths, who have made their respective chrysalises or cocoons to survive the winter. Dormant eggs among the dried leaves will hatch as caterpillars, the primary food for baby songbirds, who cannot digest seeds.

5. Sustainable Gardening Practices There are two things I do in my yard that are the most important for making it healthy for wildlife: nontoxic weed control and increasing mulch. I’ve found practical, nontoxic solutions for weed and insect control, such as organic slow-release fertilizer for healthy grass, a pedestal fan to blow away mosquitos and picaridin mosquito lotion for outside activities, so that birds, bees and butterflies can thrive here safely.

Turf grass is no man’s land when it comes to feeding wildlife. I’ve shrunk turf areas and enlarged natural mulched islands. Dead leaves in the naturalized areas under my trees not only act as fertilizer and mulch, but also as butterfly nurseries. The leaves of an oak tree feed the caterpillars of more than 500 species of moths and butterflies.

Ann Litrel is an artist and certified Master Naturalist. She instructs nature journal workshops and paints in her studio, Ann Litrel Art, in Towne Lake.