The reactions that I have seen from the empty yard remind me of a story. The story is the one about the two shoe salesman visiting a far away land. The first salesman shows up to the first remote village in the country. The weather in the country is such that the people are able to walk around without any shoes. Dejected, the salesman calls back to the head office of the shoe company and complains, “I am heading home.  There exists not opportunity here, the population does not ware any shoes”. The second salesman shows up to the same village. After noticing the same condition as the first salesman makes the call to the company headquarters.  The second salesman excitedly reports that he needs as much inventory as they can spare “because the people are not waring any shoes!”.

So the garden is an empty slate.  The house my wife and I purchased before starting our family had a similar condition. The front was landscaped.  The back was not. There was literally nothing. It was completely empty. We had a landscape architect draw up plans and we implemented them ourselves. It is a great feeling and sense of accomplishment to do the landscaping of your garden.

I plan to help Donna design and layout the back yard garden. We are going to put in a solar bird bath in the new flower bed along the north side of the home. We will put a hanging bird bath in the existing tree in the back yard. We want to attract humming birds so we will be planting brightly color flowering plants throughout the garden. Several hummingbird feeders will be strategically placed throughout both the front and back yard.

I hope Donna takes the approach of the second salesman and is optimistic about the opportunities afforded by the blank slate that is her new garden.

There are a couple of reasons to use solar power to keep that water moving around in your birdbath.  Birds like moving water.  Birds know that moving water is safer water.  A solar birdbath fountain will keep the water moving and circulating within the fountain.  Mosquito are less likely to lay eggs in moving water.  The sound of the moving water is very relaxing for people.  Using a solar powered pump to keep the water moving can be easier then running power out to your birdbath.  You are using renewable power source with solar as well.

When selecting a place to put your birdbath it is important to have all day direct sun light.  A shady area of your garden is a bad choice.  A better choice for shady area is a birdbath water wiggler.  Water wigglers normally run off two D cell batteries.  You can use rechargeable batteries and like solar you don’t have to run a power line out to the garden.

Another option to consider is the solar bird bath insert.  This is a solar panel and pump with decorative lines that extend up over the birdbath.  When placed in direct sunlight water is recirculated from the birdbath bowl up into pipes and then back into the bowl.  The birdbath fountains generally have an extra reservoir to hold extra water.  This is not the case with a simple insert.

Passive solar is used in the garden for a bird watering stations.   These are designed to keep the water from freezing in the winter.  For maximum performance it is a good idea to place these in direct sunlight as well.  I have heard there are designs using active solar to keep the water warm but I have not had any experience with these models.  If anyone would like to share their results with this type of unit please feel free to do so with a comment on this article.