Plant collection

Seed Plants for Birds

Seed plants for birds grow the feeder: American Goldfinches eat seeds almost exclusively — composites such as sunflowers, thistle and asters, grasses, and trees like alder and birch ⁸ — and a bed of native composites left standing feeds them into winter.

Growing facts below are from the Wildflower Center's Native Plant Database, the case for natives is Audubon's ¹, and bird diets from All About Birds ⁸⁹ and Project FeederWatch ¹⁰.

Common sunflower head — first among seed plants for birds, and the source of black-oil sunflower — Photo: Cephas, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Seed plants for birds: composite flowers for finches

Common sunflower seeds are sought by many species of wild birds ² — FeederWatch calls black-oil sunflower the preferred food for a wide variety of birds ¹⁰. Purple coneflower's spiny heads and black-eyed susan's cones hold seed for granivorous birds; the Wildflower Center notes birds enjoy black-eyed susan's ripe seeds ³⁴. Leave all three standing after bloom.

Trees and shrubs with seed and nuts

American beech nuts are among the most important wildlife foods ⁵ — Tufted Titmice eat beech nuts and acorns and choose the largest seeds they can ⁹. Paper birch is used by songbirds and ground birds ⁶, and goldfinches eat birch seed ⁸. Common buttonbush nutlets are eaten by ducks, water birds and shorebirds ⁷.

Why native plants first

Native plants are those that occur naturally in the region where they evolved, and Audubon calls them the ecological basis on which birds depend: without them and the insects that co-evolved with them, local birds cannot survive ¹. The scale matters — a native oak supports over 500 species of caterpillars where a ginkgo hosts five, and it takes more than 6,000 caterpillars to raise one brood of chickadees ¹. Most nursery landscaping plants are alien species, so choosing natives is the single landscaping decision with the clearest effect on bird populations ¹.

The alternative is what most yards already have. Audubon notes that manicured lawn now covers over 40 million acres of the United States as a green monoculture, that the traditional suburban lawn carries on average ten times more chemical pesticide per acre than farmland, and that the continental U.S. has lost 150 million acres of habitat and farmland to sprawl ¹. Every bed of natives that replaces turf is habitat that lawn cannot be, and long-lived native trees such as oaks and maples also store carbon ¹.

Check the native range before buying: the Wildflower Center record for this species lists the states and provinces where it occurs naturally ², and Audubon's zip-code native plant database narrows that to your area and the bird groups each plant attracts ¹. Once established, native plants generally need little maintenance and far less water than lawn, and they do not need the pesticides that make a yard poor bird habitat ¹.

Each plant above links to its own profile with the Wildflower Center's native range, so you can confirm it occurs naturally where you live before buying ¹.

More plant guides

Common Sunflower →Purple Coneflower →Black-eyed Susan →Common Buttonbush →American Beech →Paper Birch →Cardinal Flower →Trumpet Honeysuckle →Native plants for birds →Berry plants for birds →Nectar plants for birds →Shelter plants for birds →

Frequently asked questions

What plants produce seeds for goldfinches?

Sunflower, coneflower and black-eyed susan among composites, plus birch and alder among trees ²³⁴⁸.

Should I deadhead flowers if I want birds?

No — the seed heads are the food. Leave them standing through fall and winter.