Many people work hard to make their gardens attractive to birds by setting up bird feeders, by growing plants that provide food and shelter for birds, and by keeping fresh water available year-round. But one of the most exciting ways to experience birds in your garden is to actually see them nesting in the low branches of an apple tree, in the azalea bushes, deep in a wisteria, in a holly or way up in a venerable oak. There's nothing quite like watching birds build a nest and raise their young right in your garden.

"It's a lot of fun. Finding a nest is like finding a treasure," says Robyn Bailey, who works with the NestWatch program at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, N.Y. When people find a nest, they often think they shouldn't look too closely, but it's perfectly all right to watch.

"There's nothing like getting a glimpse into the intimate aspects of a bird's life cycle," Bailey says. She started her career as an official nest searcher, collecting information about nests for Cornell researchers, and now works closely with NestWatch, which encourages everyone to become an amateur bird biologist, tracking birds as they build their nests and raise their young.

Birds scouting for a place to build a nest are looking for more than a sturdy limb. They're hunting for habitat. A safe spot for a nest is part of that, but they also need water and food, in other words, plenty of bugs. Insects (and spiders) are full of protein, and they are the primary diet of most nestlings.

A garden with a bit of leaf litter under the shrubs looks very appealing to wrens and brown thrashers; they both turn over leaves constantly, snapping up bugs for themselves and their chicks. Birds also look for insects in the craggy bark of trees, on rose bushes, in the vegetable garden, under in the eaves, in every nook and cranny. Some birds (kingbirds, swallows, bluebirds and others) snatch flying insects out of the air. "Something like 4,000 insects are required for a chickadee to raise a clutch," Bailey says.

Most people find their first nest accidentally, she says. You might be trimming the shrubs and discover a cardinal sitting on her eggs, or you'll see a mockingbird coming and going from the boxwoods and hear the eager nestlings wake up with a peep every time she disappears down into the greenery. Some birds build their nests in plain view, in the tangled vines on a rose arbor or in a hanging basket on the porch. Carolina wrens, in particular, are not shy about nesting in potted plants, window boxes "or any little scrap of habitat," Bailey says.

Birdhouses -- the professionals call them nesting boxes -- enable you a to attract cavity-nesting birds, such as wrens, bluebirds, titmice, chickadees and woodpeckers, to a spot you know you won't miss. They're handsome architectural features in their own right, in classic or modern styles. Nesting boxes should be sturdy and well-ventilated; they do not need outside perches.

Once you find a nest in your own garden or in your neighborhood, you'll pick up on clues and start to see more -- you may discover a nest while you're walking the dog, or spot a mockingbird's nest in the bushes at the grocery-store parking lot. "It gets easier every time you find one," Bailey says.

Nests are all different, you'll discover. Some birds are tidy housekeepers, and others are scavengers, cobbling together their nests with unexpected assortments of local materials. Robins build rustic nests of grass and twigs, held together with mud. A blue jay's nest might incorporate scraps of plastic plant labels or twist-ties from the garden. A hummingbird nest, if you're lucky enough to spot one, is made with moss and small bits of bark and leaves, all held together with spider silk and camouflaged with lichen.

"They're all beautiful," Bailey says. "You have to respect the engineering that goes into a nest."

When you find a nest or discover birds building one, don't interfere with them. By the time they lay their eggs, they're pretty well committed to the nest they have built, Bailey says, and you can safely check on the nest every few days. It's OK to take pictures of the eggs or nestlings, but don't use the flash feature on your camera, and don't become a nuisance, she says. Don't handle the eggs. And go to the NestWatch web site to report on what you have found: it's a chance to contribute to important research, "measuring nature's success" in terms of nests, eggs and fledglings, NestWatch says. The science is important, but the rewards are measured in other ways, too.

"To me, watching nests is the most rewarding aspect of bird-watching as a hobby," Bailey says. She especially loves "that moment when the chicks are sitting on the edge of the nest getting ready to take their first flight." At that moment, you're flying, too.

SIDEBAR

NOTES ON NESTS

For more nest-watching ideas and resources check the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's NestWatch website (nestwatch.org), which includes information about birds and their nests and nesting habits, plans for nesting boxes and platforms, and suggestions on how and where to place them. YardMap (yardmap.org), also sponsored by the Cornell lab, encourages gardeners to map their property, showing backyard bird habitat features.

Here are some ideas to encourage birds to make their homes in your garden from Robyn Bailey, program assistant for both NestWatch and YardMap:

-- Provide nesting boxes.

-- Make nesting material available. You could fill a small basket with bits of wool or fabric scraps, feathers from an old pillow, shredded paper, cotton balls and short pieces of string. Leave it in an open place on the porch, or stuff it into a wire basket and hang it from a branch.

-- Do not touch birds' eggs. If a chick falls out of a nest before it is even able to stand on its own two feet, put it back quickly and gently, then move away from the nest.

-- Do not use insecticides and herbicides during nesting season. Most songbirds feed their nestlings insects.

-- When birds are nesting and nestlings are starting to fledge, "keep your cats inside," Bailey says. Young birds "need two or three days to figure out where they are and how to fly."

(For editorial questions, please contact Clint Hooker at chooker@amuniversal.com or the Universal Uclick Editorial Department at -uueditorial@amuniversal.com)

The gardening season never ends when you have a greenhouse: There's always something growing on.

Greenhouses give cold-climate gardeners the luxury of keeping their fingers in the dirt through the winter, and warm-climate gardeners a chance to experiment with truly tropical plants year-round. In any climate, a greenhouse is the perfect place to get ahead of the calendar and start seeds and tend to transplants. In a greenhouse, in the dead of winter, lemon blossoms perfume the air, basil and other tender herbs flourish, seedlings push happily up into the light and warmth. Not surprisingly, gardeners thrive in a greenhouse environment, too.

"A lot of people just want to sit among their plants and do nothing, just enjoy it," says Shelley Newman, vice president of Hartley Botanic, which has been making greenhouses in England since 1938.

Plant collectors used to be the main customers for greenhouses, says Charley Yaw, owner of Charley's Greenhouse & Garden in Mount Vernon, Wash. Orchids, tender cacti and fancy flowers filled the shelves in these elaborate structures. Now, a large new generation of gardeners interested in starting seeds early and vegetable gardening in the offseason is making room in its backyards for hard-working greenhouses.

"There are a ton more greenhouses being sold today than 20 years ago," Yaw says. "And it doesn't take a real expensive or sophisticated greenhouse to grow vegetables."

Greenhouses can be just about any size, but the experts generally recommend a greenhouse with a footprint of about 8 by 10 feet. Yaw's formula for customers is easy: "Figure out what you want, then add 50 percent," he says. If two people will be working in the greenhouse together, a 10-by-12-foot space allows more elbow room, Yaw says, and more growing space, too. Newman recommends an even larger size for real enthusiasts; Hartley Botanic's most popular greenhouse size is 11 by 20 feet. "I'll tell you this," she says. "Everybody underbuys."

Building restrictions and setback limits may influence your decision, so it's a good idea to check on local zoning regulations before you get started. Temporary structures may not be regulated. Barbara Damrosch and Eliot Coleman, owners of Four Season Farm in Maine, rely on temporary 10-by-12-foot hoop-top greenhouses placed right on top of the soil to extend the seasons in their vegetable gardens.

Putting up a permanent greenhouse requires a bit of planning. You want it to look nice in your garden. You'll have to consider the layout of your property and the relationship of the greenhouse to the rest of the garden and your home. It should be on the south side of your house to take best advantage of the light, and away from screening evergreen trees.

A path through the middle should be paved solidly, to avoid muddy feet; gravel or pavers under the growing benches also help keep the greenhouse tidy. It's practical to have a patio or pad of pavers, bricks or stone outside the greenhouse door; this area can also be used as a staging area for plants making the transition from the greenhouse to the garden.

Hartley Botanic's greenhouses have glass panels, but not all greenhouses use glass. Plastic polycarbonate panels are popular, Yaw says, and the material is especially good insulation. Polycarbonate also diffuses the light, so plants do not get burned in bright sun.

Depending on where you live, an electric or gas heating system may be necessary, although passive heat will suffice on many days. Fans and automatic vents help prevent overheating.

Donna Clark, a retired garden designer in Greensboro, N.C., had a modest, hardworking greenhouse on the back of her two-car garage when she lived in Connecticut. When she and her husband sold their house and moved south, her dream of a Hartley Botanic greenhouse came true. Her Victorian-style greenhouse is just 11 by 10 feet, with a gravel floor. Shelves for plants line the sides, and a potting bench fits neatly against the back wall. "Some people want a fancy car," she says. "I wanted a fancy greenhouse."

Clark grows annual flowers from seed in her greenhouse, nurturing the tiny plants before transplanting them into the garden; she also starts seeds for her extensive vegetable garden. Last year, she grew cucumbers in the greenhouse, and harvested them long before cucumbers could have been produced in the garden outdoors. This winter, she is using her greenhouse as a studio experimenting with mosaics.

Greenhouses are not an impulse purchase. Inexpensive do-it-yourself models start at about $500 and run up to about $2,000. Larger greenhouses with more features are substantial structures and cost $5,000 or more. Hartley Botanic's fancy Victorian greenhouse is quite an investment, at $45,000 to $50,000.

The winter months are the perfect time to be considering a greenhouse. Some models are on sale, and if you get started now, you can have plans in place so that construction can proceed quickly, whenever the weather allows. You'll be out there with seed packets in hand, long before the gardening season begins for everybody else.

SOURCES

-- Charley's Greenhouse & Garden; www.charleysgreenhouse.com

-- Gardener's Supply Co.; www.gardeners.com

-- Hartley Botanic; www.hartley-botanic.com

-- Growers Supply; www.growerssupply.com

(For editorial questions, please contact Clint Hooker at chooker@amuniversal.com or the Universal Uclick Editorial Department at -uueditorial@amuniversal.com)

Gardeners looking for colorful, low-maintenance plants are discovering that shrubs do the job and a bit more. Hydrangeas, azaleas and easy-care roses are claiming the spots where perennials once were preferred, and backyard landscapes are changing for the better.

The shrubs themselves are undergoing a transformation, too. "The trend we see right now is taking the classic shrubs like hydrangeas or lilacs and improving on them in some way," says Shannon Springer at Spring Meadow Nursery and Proven Winners in Michigan. Reblooming and long-blooming shrubs are one of the company's top priorities, she says.

Flowering shrubs have truly become the new perennials, says Tony Fulmer, chief horticulture officer of Chalet Nursery in Wilmette, Ill., near Chicago. Annual and perennial flowers remain popular, of course, but the big nursery's five teams of garden designers are making increasing use of hydrangeas, shrub roses, forsythia and other flowering shrubs -- especially compact forms -- in their landscaping plans for new gardeners just getting their fingers into the dirt and for everyone else in need of gardens and plants that don't require a lot of attention.

"Anything that performs well as a foliage plant and blooms for a long time, we are going to sell the heck out of it," Fulmer says. Chalet's retail and landscaping divisions sell millions of dollars' worth of plants every year; hydrangeas and shrub roses represent more than half of the sales of flowering shrubs, he says.

Shrubs have always been popular, but new introductions have exploded in the past few years, offering gardeners and designers more choices than ever before.

"What we have found is that designers are very solution-oriented," Springer says. Flowering shrubs with an extended season of bloom have a distinct edge "because people aren't just looking for two weeks of color." Gardeners and designers also want "shrubs that are more compact, less gangly, and look great in containers."

One of the most popular new hydrangeas is Limelight, a hardy, mid- to late-summer blooming shrub with large blooms that open with sparkling chartreuse petals, which change to creamy white and then fade to a soft, deep rose. Limelight and Weigela Wine and Roses, which has purple leaves and deep magenta flowers, "are our top dogs," Springer says. A new reblooming weigela called Sonic Bloom is part of the revolution of rebloomers, introducing an old-time favorite with modern characteristics to a new generation of gardeners.

Fulmer says garden-shop customers want "long-bloom, they want hardy, and they want no diseases, and plants that are insect-free. Now they also want compact habit." The Limelight hydrangea grows to six to eight feet tall, but Little Lime is only half that size. "It has been an amazing seller," he says. A new introduction, Bobo, which blooms so heavily that the leaves are hidden, is going to be even more popular, Fulmer predicts.

Shorter plants naturally need less pruning than shrubs that grow 10 feet tall or more. They fit more gracefully under windows, they will not block your view as you back down the driveway, and they are cozy companions in flower beds, where they remain in scale with perennial peonies, iris and daylilies. Compact shrubs never become thugs that turn a patio into a cave, and they add a graceful and manageable layer of color, texture and interest to the dappled light under trees.

Flowers have more appeal than foliage, Fulmer and Springer say, although bright chartreuse leaves, foliage with a coppery sheen or shrubs with variegated leaves all turn heads in a garden shop -- and in a garden -- especially if long-blooming flowers are also part of the package. Hybridizers are working to reinvent one-season shrubs, like deutzia and forsythia, introducing plants that bloom more vigorously in season, and look more distinguished when their flowers are spent.

Finding a spot for these new shrubs is easier than you think, Fulmer says. Removing an overgrown shrub makes room for new varieties and fresh design. Climate change and bugs and blights have also opened up some planting spots in mature gardens. Emerald ash borer, a destructive beetle that has spread to 18 states across the Northeast and Upper Midwest and is expected to kill millions of trees, has once again reminded city planners, garden designers and gardeners of the importance of diversity. As ash trees are replaced, understory plantings will also change.

"People who have had shade will have sun," Fulmer says. "They will mourn the loss of their trees, but people who are gardeners are going to be excited about the possibility of having sun and a different palette." Among the colorful ranks of flowering shrubs, there is a lot to be excited about.

SIDEBAR

TAKE YOUR PICK: GREAT FLOWERING SHRUBS

-- Hydrangeas are hot sellers, and there are many great choices. Let's Dance and Endless Summer cultivars are hardy mop-head hydrangeas that bloom all summer long with showy pink or blue flowers. Limelight and Little Lime bloom in mid- to late summer, with creamy white clusters of flowers that mature to deep rose. Bobo is a compact, especially heavy-blooming hydrangea. Quick Fire blooms early.

-- Compact and reblooming lilacs are growing in popularity. Miss Kim grows slowly to six feet tall and can be kept pruned even smaller. Bloomerang lilacs put on a show in spring and rebloom in summer and fall. (Clipping off spring blooms encourages rebloom.) They grow to about five feet tall.

-- Low-maintenance, long-blooming, colorful shrub roses "have made roses a lot more interesting to people," says Tony Fulmer of Chalet Nursery in Wilmette, Ill. Knock Out, Drift and Flower Carpet roses all bloom from spring through frost and can be pruned with hedge shears. They "have changed the rose business dramatically," he says.

-- Hybridizers working with flowering shrubs have made significant progress with rose of Sharon, which thrives in hot, sunny places. Azurri Satin and Sugar Tip are both seedless varieties, which means they will not become a nuisance in your garden.

-- Fulmer likes the Show Off series of forsythia, including the little Sugar Baby cultivar, which only grows to about 30 inches tall. In spring, the branches of these forsythia are covered with bright yellow flowers. They look like bright yellow bottle brushes, Fulmer says.

-- Shrubs with variegated or colored foliage sparkle even when they're not in bloom. Double Play spireas are adaptable and hardy, and their glowing foliage makes a nice backdrop for summer flowers. The cream-edged leaves of deutzia Creme Fraiche and the bright lime-colored foliage of deutzia Chardonnay Pearls stand out all summer, long after the spring flowers have faded.

CAPTIONS AND CREDIT

(NOTE: These photos are for ONE-TIME use ONLY. At Home photos, with the proper credits, are to be run ONLY with At Home stories. Conversion to black and white is OK.)

(For editorial questions, please contact Clint Hooker at chooker@amuniversal.com or the Universal Uclick Editorial Department at -uueditorial@amuniversal.com)