Plant guide by bird

Plants for Black-capped Chickadees

Plants for black-capped chickadees have to feed an insect-eater: in spring, summer and fall, insects, spiders and other animal food make up 80–90 percent of the diet, and about half of it in winter, the rest seeds and berries ¹.

That makes native trees the first plant — Audubon's count is more than 6,000 caterpillars to raise one brood of chickadees ². Growing facts are from the Wildflower Center [3–7].

Black-capped chickadee — plants for black-capped chickadees supply caterpillars, seed and nest cavities — Photo: Dawn Huczek from USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Plants for black-capped chickadees: trees for nests and caterpillars

Chickadees nest in small natural cavities and old Downy Woodpecker holes, and often excavate their own cavity in dead snags or rotten branches, frequently alder or birch ¹. Paper birch, used by songbirds and ground birds and host to the Luna moth and Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, is the tree for both nest and caterpillars ³; American beech offers nesting sites and hosts the Early Hairstreak ⁷. Leave dead limbs standing where safe — chickadees also sleep in cavities they excavate themselves ¹.

Seed and winter food

At feeders chickadees take mostly sunflower seeds, peanuts and suet ¹; common sunflower grown in the yard is the same seed on the stalk ⁴. Virginia creeper's fruit feeds chickadees through the winter — they head the Wildflower Center's list ⁵ — and eastern red cedar gives dense evergreen cover and berries ⁶.

Chickadees hide seeds to eat later, each in a different spot, and remember thousands of hiding places ¹, so a yard with seed heads and bark crevices works all winter.

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 ². 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 ². Most nursery landscaping plants are alien species, so choosing natives is the single landscaping decision with the clearest effect on bird populations ².

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 ². 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 ².

Check the native range before buying: the Wildflower Center record for this species lists the states and provinces where it occurs naturally ³, and Audubon's zip-code native plant database narrows that to your area and the bird groups each plant attracts ². 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 ².

More plant guides

Canadian Serviceberry →American Beech →Paper Birch →Cardinal Flower →Trumpet Honeysuckle →American Elderberry →Flowering Dogwood →Winterberry →Native plants for birds →Berry plants for birds →Seed plants for birds →Nectar plants for birds →Shelter plants for birds →

Frequently asked questions

What trees do black-capped chickadees nest in?

Rotten branches and snags, frequently alder or birch; they excavate their own cavity ¹³.

What plants feed chickadees?

Native trees for caterpillars first, then sunflower for seed and Virginia creeper for winter fruit ¹²⁵.