Paradise in the Two Parks #2: What’s Blooming in Your Yard?

Planting berry-bearing trees and shrubs is one way to attract birds to your yard, which for me, is a key element of creating a personal paradise.  Watching birds is a joy that the whole family can share. Once the birds discover that your yard provides the things they need such as Food, Shelter and Water, they will take up residence and provide you with plenty of beauty and entertainment.  You’d be surprised how many different types of birds can be found in the two parks throughout the year.

Here are two berry bearing choices for your yard that are producing berries right now, all around town: the leatherleaf mahonia and the serviceberry tree. Both of these choices will do well in partially shady yards.  The serviceberry will also bloom pretty but fleeting white blossoms in spring.  The leatherleaf mahonia will bloom very early in spring with clusters of small yellow blossoms. These blossoms open with a delicious fragrance that perfumes your garden and attracts all the newly awakened pollinating insects such as bees. But right now, in early June, it’s all about the berries and the birds!

Other University Park Residents enjoy berries so you may even get a visit from the famed University Park Red Fox.  Serviceberries are tasty for humans as well as other creatures and taste rather like a blueberry.  Some people use them to make jam.   Foxes are fond of berries, as well as birds, insects, mice, snakes, rabbits, nuts and fruits! So if you plant berry bearing trees and shrubs you are creating habitat for creatures under stress from all the recent local development. I find it thrilling to spot these elusive creatures in my yard or on a walk. If you are worried about rabies, according to the Maryland Natural Resources Department, raccoons are the creatures to worry about as they account for 85% of the cases in Maryland while red foxes and skunks are only 5%. And foxes don’t just come out during the evening hours, you can spot them during the day too, here are three pictures caught on my cell phone where you can catch a glimpse of one of our resident University Park red foxes going about his business in broad daylight on Van Buren Street.

So What's Blooming In Your Yard? Please let us know what's blooming in your personal paradise around the two parks!