Fish Ponds & Frog Ponds
Adding a pond to your garden can turn it into a tranquil oasis for you and for native frogs or fish, and it doesn't have to be difficult. Read a free fact sheet about frog and fish ponds here.
A pond for local native frogs or fish helps out the local environment and provides lots of enjoyment for you and your family.
A frog pond can be as simple as a styrafoam box, a plastic pool, an old baby bath, a garden pot and so on.
Or you can establish a more permanent habitat by digging in a pond and planting out the surrounding area with native reeds, sedges, rushes, grasses, ground cover, shrubs and trees of different heights. Some leaf litter mulch with rocks and logs nearby will also provide a great place for frogs to hide from predators, chill out, and find a tasty insect meal.
Read a free fact sheet about building your own native frog or fish pond here
Tips to establish your own native frog pond are available here
Read tips for your own Australian native fish pond here
Nest boxes
Apart from putting in and maintaining plants in your garden, you can provide birds with an additional shelter source. A nestbox is a box built especially for animals to nest in. Nest boxes are usually built for particular species of birds, but some mammals such as possums may also use them.
Click here to find out how to build a nest box for a possum.
Click here to purchase a ready made nest box for all kinds of native species.
Download a free factsheet on how to build your own nest box.
Butterfly Box, Ladybird House & Microbat Roosting Box
Butterflies, ladybirds and microbats are looking for warm sheltered places to spend winter.
Providing a house will help out and mean a lot more creatures around your place in the spring time.
Click here to find out how to build a butterfly box
Click here to download a factsheet on how to build a ladybird house.
Find out how to build a microbat roosting box.
Chemical Free Gardening
A chemical free garden is a healthy garden for you, your family and the animals that visit.
Chemical fertilisers and pesticides are designed to provide a quick solution for common gardening problems.
When it comes to gardening, there are often very simple, much cheaper chemical-free solutions at hand.
Click here to find out more about Chemical Free Gardening
Let Nature Be Your Bug Controller
Did you know Ladybirds love to eat up aphids, scale insects and mites?
Instead of using chemicals or pesticides, let ladybirds munch away your bugs. Even low toxicity environmentally-friendly insecticides such as pyrethrum and garlic spray can kill ladybirds, so lay off the bottle.
As well as encouraging ladybirds by planting marigold, parsley, coriander, dill, fennel, alfalfa, zucchini, melons and cucumbers, you can also buy adult ladybirds to help establish a population at your place.
Visit Eco Organic Garden or Bugs for Bugs to buy ladybirds.
Possums in your Roof!
Ringtail and Brushtail Possums love to sleep outdoors in tree hollows, but competition is stiff. It takes up to one hundred years or more for hollows to form in Eucalypt trees, and if these trees are removed, it's a long time before suitable hollows replace the ones that are gone. Possums are one of the most commonly seen native species in urban areas, and when they can't find good places to sleep outdoors, they move into our rooves!
Click here to find what you can do about possums living in your roof.
Gardening to attract birds & animals
Have a look at these resources if you want to build a garden to attract and enjoy native birds.
'Birdscaping your garden' with the Cumberland Bird Observer's Club
