Get ready for some controversy, a shocking idea and perhaps some angry letters to the editor:

It is recommended that we all stop buying seed and filling bird feeders.

The Natural Wildlife Federation and other naturalist agree that food for wild life should come from native sources. This means adding more trees and shrubs with berries and seeds as a winter food source and not using seed to fill a bird feeder.

Take a deep breath and consider the reasons:

Bird seed attracts rodents including rats. A surge in the rat population in Western Washington has been linked to an increase of seed-filled bird feeders. (The city of Seattle even has a bulletin about what to do when you find a rat in your toilet – Yikes!)

There is also the concern that providing the wrong type of seed at the wrong time of year interferes with the natural migration and nutrition of the birds. Overfed birds, like obese pets and people, have shorter life spans.

The rats and other rodents including invasive squirrel species and nuisance birds such as crows, pigeons and starlings are known to live longer and multiply as they feed on spilled and rejected bird seed. Nuisance birds also destroy the nests and young of our native birds. Keeping rats and mice away from bird feeders by using poisons or traps can endanger the birds you are trying to protect.

Another reason to plead against bird feeders is that during the winter months it is especially difficult to keep seed dry and mold-free. Rain can quickly turn your kind-hearted offering of bird seed into a disease and weed-spreading disaster.

In Western Washington there are now four different bird diseases spread by contaminated seed at feeders. Finally, there is the concern over introducing invasive weeds to the area hidden in a package of bird seed.

So what is a bird-lover to do? Stop with the fast food diet and go natural instead. This means creating a bird habitat in your garden providing shelter, water and a more natural food source from plants and insects.

Offer high protein bird snacks by allowing more insects.

Encourage the good bugs that control the bad bugs by never spraying the entire landscape with an insecticide. Overspraying with insecticides not only causes birds to avoid your garden but it can also cause a rebound effect of the insects you were trying to control.

Allow some fallen leaves around the base of your shrubs so the birds can rummage for worms and grubs. Not all birds eat seed, especially in the winter. Many need the insects that bore into bark and hide under leaves. The super tidy landscape is one often lacking in winter bird food. (How’s that for a great excuse for more relaxed garden maintenance?)

Provide the birds with the shelter of evergreens.

Native plants naturally shelter our native birds so allow or add native huckleberry, Oregon grape, cedar and firs. In a smaller garden provide shelter with evergreen yews where tiny birds can hide, rhododendrons with large leaves that act like bird umbrellas and by adding some prickly shrubs such as barberry – food from the berries, protection from the barbs.

Add interesting trees with “boring” bark.

Woodpeckers and other insect eaters need stumps, snags and trees that support boring insects. This means adding white barked birch trees (great for winter interest) because birds with long beaks can pluck out the insects that love to bore into birch trees. Tree boring insects rarely kill healthy trees but they do provide a neatly stored, high protein diet all winter for the birds. So far rats and squirrels have not figured out how to steal the food supply that bores into the bark of trees.

Provide clean water

A bird bath with a shallow bottom is perfect for summer bathing but in the winter a water feature that bubbles, drips or moves will not freeze and can attract as many bird varieties as a feeder. Outdoor fountain kits are now available at home centers and nurseries and require less maintenance than filling and cleaning a bird feeder.

Leave seed heads on flowers and grasses in the fall.

Plant sunflowers, coneflowers, aster, and other plants with winter seed heads. Add ornamental and native grass so the tiny birds can feast on the seed heads that are held up high atop delicate stems and out of reach of the rats and squirrels.

Beautify the winter landscape with berries.

Cotoneaster, holly, snowberry, beauty berry and any of the other native berry plants such as Oregon grape, huckleberry and blue berry are nature’s version of health food for our native birds. Gardeners that landscape for the birds are gardeners that enjoy natural insect control and a more beautiful winter landscape.

Next month in this column you’ll learn more about the best plants for attracting birds to the garden.