Native plants for birds
Feeders are a supplement; a bird garden is fruit, seed, and cover. These natives feed songbirds directly — berries timed to migration, seedheads worth leaving standing through the winter, and dense growth to nest in. The most useful thing you can do with them is nothing: skip the fall cleanup and let the seedheads and leaf litter stand until spring.
Bedfellow lists 911 of these.
The 30 most-observed are listed here — see all 911 in search.
- Red Maple (Acer rubrum)
- Virginia Creeper (Parthenocissus quinquefolia)
- Pin Oak (Quercus palustris)
- Sweet Gum (Liquidambar styraciflua)
- Bloodroot (Sanguinaria canadensis)
- Eastern Redbud (Cercis canadensis)
- Christmas Fern (Polystichum acrostichoides)
- False Solomon's Seal (Maianthemum racemosum)
- Tulip Poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera)
- Sassafras (Sassafras albidum)
- American Beech (Fagus grandifolia)
- Eastern White Pine (Pinus strobus)
- Eastern Red Cedar (Juniperus virginiana)
- Sensitive Fern (Onoclea sensibilis)
- Silver Maple (Acer saccharinum)
- Partridgeberry (Mitchella repens)
- American Beautyberry (Callicarpa americana)
- Boxelder (Acer negundo)
- Green Ash (Fraxinus pennsylvanica)
- Jack-in-the-pulpit (Arisaema triphyllum)
- Skunk Cabbage (Symplocarpus foetidus)
- Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta)
- Wild Geranium (Geranium maculatum)
- Buttonbush (Cephalanthus occidentalis)
- American Sycamore (Platanus occidentalis)
- Sugar Maple (Acer saccharum)
- Black Cherry (Prunus serotina)
- Eastern Hemlock (Tsuga canadensis)
- Canada Mayflower (Maianthemum canadense)
- American Holly (Ilex opaca)