Five insights about birds in San Francisco’s community gardens

A community garden in the heart of a city can be an oasis – an island of greenery where people can escape the sounds of traffic, sink their hands into the earth, and connect with the natural world. These spaces can be especially important in lower-income neighborhoods, where historical and ongoing discrimination means people have less access to greenspace and all its benefits (read more about nature’s mental health benefits and urban nature in particular). Many previous studies have found that lower income neighborhoods have less biodiversity and more “pest” species like pigeons and sparrows, leading people to experience lower-quality interactions with nature. 

However, our study, recently published in Landscape and Urban Planning, shows this is not always the case -- at least not in community gardens. We worked in 20 community gardens in high- and low-income neighborhoods in the city of San Francisco. Focused on people’s interactions with birds, we counted birds and surveyed people to explore where people came into contact with species they cared about, as well as where there were greater numbers of species and birds overall. We found people are having meaningful experiences with nature in community gardens across widely different neighborhoods, even when other types of nearby greenspace are lacking. 

Here are five things we learned about birds in community gardens:

1. Although birds do sometimes eat garden plants, gardeners felt positively towards birds overall. Gardeners liked birds for many different reasons - they enjoyed seeing and hearing them, felt they played an important role in the ecosystem, and felt that they were beneficial to the garden.
2. Many gardeners wished to see more birds in the gardens. One gardener shared, “I love birds and I hope the garden provides a refuge for them,” and another remarked, “Seeing more birds would make me feel like I'm doing a good job as a gardener and steward because I'd be able to create a welcoming environment for them.”
3. Attitudes towards birds differed based on the species. Some species, like the vibrant Anna’s Hummingbird, were quite popular, with people appreciating their colorful, iridescent appearance and role in pollinating gardens. Others, like the American Crow, were more controversial—while gardeners noted their intelligence, they also called them noisy and aggressive.
4. Despite previous research suggesting otherwise, there were no differences in the number of species or the number of birds overall between gardens in low- and high-income neighborhoods.
5. In addition, gardeners were not more likely to encounter species that they felt positively about, like Anna’s Hummingbirds, in high-income neighborhoods.  

While unexpected, these findings were encouraging, suggesting community gardens could provide an opportunity for people in both low- and high- income neighborhoods in San Francisco to have positive experiences with nature. Community gardens could act as win-win spaces for people and biodiversity in the city, creating habitat, access to nature and the mental and physical health benefits it provides, food security, and community. 

If you want to create a garden that attracts birds, there are a few simple steps you can follow:

• Plant crops that flower and fruit at different times throughout the year so that you are providing birds with a consistent food source.
• Include plants with a variety of different shapes and sizes, which will give birds a diversity of opportunities for sheltering and foraging.
• Incorporate non-crop vegetation, such as trees, hedgerows, and native pollinator gardens, all of which attract birds.
• Get in touch with your local Audubon chapter to learn more about the best plants for birds in your area. You can also check out these bird-friendly gardening resources from Audubon and the National Wildlife Federation.

Urban community gardens are valuable resources for people and birds in cities. The gardeners’ words revealed just how special they are: “The garden reconnects us to what is important: growing nourishing food and connecting with the natural world around us.” Encourage your city to support community gardens, and consider getting involved in your local garden today! 

This release was written by Kelley Langhans, who recently completed her Ph.D. under Professor Gretchen Daily with the Stanford University Center for Conservation Biology and the Stanford-based Natural Capital Project. Langhans is now a postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation at Virginia Tech. Additional authors on the paper are: Alejandra Echeverri (who was with the Natural Capital Project at the time of this work and is now at the University of California, Berkeley), Maya Xu (Stanford), Meggie Callahan (University of Washington), Mei Li Palmeri (Stanford), Oliver Nguyen (Stanford), Nicole Ardoin (Stanford), and Gretchen Daily (Stanford/NatCap). This work was funded by the Winslow Foundation and the Reid and Polly Anderson Fund.

The Natural Capital Project is based out of the Stanford Doerr School of Sustainability and its Woods Institute for the Environment, and the Stanford School of Humanities and Sciences’ Department of Biology. The Center for Conservation Biology is based out of the Department of Biology as well.