Auckland's natural environment

Welcoming wildlife

Kereru NZ pigeon

By planting native plants you'll provide shelter, shade, nesting places, reduce erosion and provide food in the form of leaves, nectar, berries and seeds. By meeting a bird's basic needs with food, water, shelter and a nesting place, they'll reward you with hours of entertainment and fewer insect pests!

Want to encourage native birds to visit your garden?

• Plant shelter trees and hedges to provide suitable places for nesting, which will also harbour the insects that birds eat
• Plant trees and shrubs that produce edible seeds, berries, leaves, flowers or nectar to encourage a variety of birds
• Where appropriate, grow native plants that birds like
• Link your plantings with those on neighbouring land to increase the benefit to wildlife
• Instead of planting single species hedges around your home, or shelterbelts on a larger property, farm or school, plant a mixture of species which will provide a variety of food sources and nest sites
• By creating an environment that is suitable for insects you will attract insect feeding birds such as grey warblers, fantails, moreporks and cuckoos.

Want to encourage insects to your garden?

We often overlook the value of attracting insects to our gardens and it is important to remember that while they're often small and obscure, they play a very important role in natural processes:

• welcome worms to your compost heap and garden and they'll help aerate your soil
• puriri moths are our largest native moth and live for only one night! Plant puriri, putaputaweta and kanuka to encourage these short-lived beauties
• butterflies are attracted by lots of nectar. Plants with flowers offer a suitable landing and resting place for butterflies. If you are wanting to attract butterflies, you will need to think about supplying foods suitable for each stage of their lifecycle
• bees will often visit a garden where there is lots of nectar. While they are feasting, they start the process of seed formation by pollinating flowers.

Want to encourage lizards to your garden?

There are two types of lizards in New Zealand - skinks and geckos. Skinks have smooth, shiny skin, often brownish in colour. Geckos have velvety, baggy-looking skin, usually green, yellow or grey. Both eat insects, spiders and flies and geckos also drink nectar. In addition, skinks and geckos love small fleshy fruits and help to spread the seeds of some native plants:

• to attract skinks and geckos into your garden, you'll need to provide them safe hiding places under rocks and logs
• plant dense, wiry groundcover, vines and climbers
• mulch with chunky-grade bark and encourage leaf lifter to build under trees where you don't mow
• make rock piles where lizards can bask in the sun but hide in the crevices if danger threatens. Old scoria dry-stone walls are great places for skinks!
• plant native groundcover shrubs with juicy berries like Coprosma and Muehlenbeckia and nectar-bearing flax and pohutukawa.

Pets as predators!

While you may be encouraging birds and insects to your garden, you need to make your garden a safe place for the birds and insects you invite in:

• have your cat neutered or spayed so they can't produce unwanted kittens
• keep your cat well fed and have moving toys for it to play with, so it is less inclined to chase birds and insects
• keep your cat indoors overnight so nocturnal insects and lizards have free reign of your garden
• put a bell on your cat's collar.