Planting natives to bring wildlife to your home

A healthy home doesn't stop at the walls. Local natives bring birds, bees, butterflies and frogs back, shade the house and give you a reason to open the doors and live outside.

Why it belongs here

Trees and shrubs shade walls, windows and paving, keeping heat off the house and making outdoor spaces usable in summer. Local natives suit our soils, need less water once established, and feed the animals that evolved with them.

Plant in layers

Groundcovers: Lomandra longifolia, blue flax lily (Dianella caerulea), kangaroo grass and Hibbertia scandens. Shrubs: coast banksia and dwarf banksia for honeyeaters, weeping bottlebrush, and Leptospermum polygalifolium for birds and native bees. Trees: lilly pillies (Syzygium australe, Acmena smithii), tuckeroo and soap tree, which all fruit for birds.

Dense shrubs give small birds shelter. Check labels at the nursery: popular grevilleas like Honey Gem are hybrids, not local species.

Butterflies, bees and frogs

The vulnerable Richmond birdwing butterfly lays on the birdwing vine, Pararistolochia praevenosa. Pull out any Dutchman's pipe: it's a weed, and it kills birdwing caterpillars that feed on it. Native stingless bees (Tetragonula carbonaria) are common here and need flowers through the year and no sprays.

For frogs, build a pond with gently sloping edges, dense planting like swamp lily around it, and no goldfish. Council suggests a few small native fish like Pacific blue-eyes for mosquitoes. A low barrier and thick planting help keep cane toads out.

Water, and no sprays

A shallow bird bath, or a stick or rock in a deeper one so animals can climb out, in shade and away from where cats hide. Scrub it and change the water often. Skip pesticides: frogs can die from eating poisoned insects.

Council and local help

Sunshine Coast Council's Free Trees program lets residential ratepayers collect two free tube stock plants every six months from its Caloundra nursery, and council has run weed-swap days for free natives. Its native plants page has the our locals are beauties booklets and lists community nurseries: Coolum, Mooloolah, Florabunda in Woombye, Barung Landcare in Maleny and STEPS in Caloundra.

Barung Landcare runs Gardens for Wildlife for backyard habitat, with council grant support. Land for Wildlife supports properties with at least a hectare of bushland, and BushCare Sunshine Coast works in council reserves.