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The new University of Wisconsin Press release Birdscaping for Wisconsin and the Great Lakes Region: The 50 Best Native Plants to Attract Birds to Your Midwestern Garden includes an introduction with these sobering words:

“We’ve already lost three billion birds in the past fifty years in North America. Alarmingly, seventy species are ‘tipping point species’ that have lost half or more of their breeding population and are on track to lose another half in the next fifty years.”

But, chin up! This book is about how humans can help remedy that situation, or as the intro goes on to say: “It’s critical to do all we can to stave off more losses. No matter the size of your patch of earth, even if it’s potted plants on the patio, you can do your part to keep birds flying, singing, and gracing our lives.” [Editor’s note: Had I edited this book, I would have removed all the awful serial commas, such as the one in the previous sentence. No need for those damn things 99.9 percent of the time.]

Birdscaping is the work of Mariette Nowak, with the assistance of a bevy of bird photographers. Nowak previously wrote Birdscaping in the Midwest and is the former director of the Wehr Nature Center, which is part of the City of Milwaukee public park system. Nowak also contributed many photos of the plants, flowers, shrubs and trees that illustrate this book about how to be good neighbors to our fine feathered friends.

I recognized one name among the bird photographers – Ryan Brady. Ryan is a conservation biologist with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources who has been mentioned several times in Emily Stone’s Natural Connections column. I met Ryan in 2018 when I attended a two-day conference in a Milwaukee suburb on the decline of aerial insectivores in Wisconsin, which included an evening field trip to Lake Okauchee in southeastern Waukesha County to witness the ritual communal evening roost of chimney swifts who, during their fall migration, decided to nest inside the tall chimney of an abandoned school. The vortex of several thousand chirping chimney swifts swirling overhead reminded me of the LSD-induced bat scene “somewhere around Barstow” in Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

The book is broken down into sections highlighting plants to attract specific birds, beginning with the lovely ruby-throated hummingbird. In addition to profiles of the 10 plants, such as the beautiful Wild Columbine, Nowak also tells you why they are of value to birds and other wildlife.

She also offers fascinating facts, such as the fact that flowers attractive to hummingbirds don’t have scents. Hummingbirds are attracted to them by their color. Flowers that have coevolved alongside the hummingbird usually have long tubes with nectar (with up to 26 percent sugar content) at the base and are brightly colored – red, orange, pink. 

And here’s one I never thought of –flowers that attract hummingbirds lack landing platforms. Hummers can hover and extract the nectar, but nectar-loving insects cannot.

Bird lovers will find this book fascinating for all the great information Nowak provides on a variety of species, and plant lovers will also find much to enjoy as they learn the uses of red osier dogwood (a wetland shrub with fat, white, rich berries for migrating birds), sneezeweed (a companion plant) and choke cherry (Northern Cardinals are one of many birds that love the tart purple fruit).

In addition to hummers, there are the following chapters:
• Top 10 Plants for Goldfinches and Other Prairie Birds
• Top 10 Plants for Blue birds and Other Savanna Birds
• Top 10 Plants for Indigo Buntings and Other Shrubland Birds
• Top 10 Plants for Warblers and Other Woodland Birds (here were looking at trees – maple, birch, poplar, etc).