I’ve worked REALLY hard on making my farm a place where birds and good bugs and frogs, toads and snakes like to live. I have a lot of cover for the birds, fresh water, a full feeder (always) and then specialized foods at different times of the year. Right now the Baltimore Orioles are passing through (hopefully a few pair will stay) so there’s sugar water and orange marmalade out for them to eat. :)
As you can see from my pictures, I don’t mow every square inch around the yard; that gives cover for the anphibians who eat a lot of mosquitoes and flies, etc. We also have brown bats that are (unfortunately) in the attic; we are working on relocating them to the barn...they’re not catching on too quickly though, LOL! We have a lot of dragon flies (helps to have a lake across the road) and they eat their weight in skeeters each day, too. One evening there must’ve been a huge hatch because there was a layer of dragonflies about 6 feet off the ground darting around, feeding, and then above them were the swallows at 10-15 feet or so, doing the same.
No chemicals used, either. Chemicals REALLY effect anphibians in a very bad way. Well, I use a little Round-Up here and there, but I’ve gardened organically for the past 15 years and it has really paid off. I have little slug problems, no damage from tomato horn worms, no cutworms, etc.
Nothing I like better than seeing a Mama bird with a beak full of bugs heading back to her nest!
Just do a little something for the wildlife every season. Look up ‘planting for birds’ or ‘planting for butterflies’ or ‘planting for wildlife’ and add a perennial plant or shrub or two to your property each season. It eventually pays of in a big way!
...just stay away from the worms in my raised beds, Mama...
wow...you are really descriptive .... I enjoyed reading about your garden (except I could not handle the bats...though I know I have bats somewhere around here cause at night if the pool light is on one goes darting/flying around the water at night)