Home Builder Developer, Interior Renovation and Design

Winter offers a peaceful opportunity for bird watchers to take stock of their yards.

With fewer chores to tend, we can look over the landscape like a farmer and see what's working and what's not. This is the time to build nest boxes and make a plan for spring landscaping to make the yard more friendly to wildlife year around.

Collectively, homeowners have huge potential to boost habitat for birds. Putting out feeders is mostly for our own enjoyment. Birds rarely lack food as much as they lack habitat - the sum of effective cover available to birds for dealing with weather, escaping predators, nesting and finding a diversity of nutrition.

Providing habitat takes more commitment than providing food, as well as the often ignored necessity of year-round water.

A perfectly manicured yard, dominated by mowed grass, barked flower beds and low maintenance tam junipers can verge on being a biological desert for birds.

Find ways to "rough it up" a little and your yard is more likely to attract house wrens to hunt in the shrub beds. That's all it might take to fill your yard with one of the most beautiful songs in nature this spring when the season finally warms enough to open the windows.

Now's the time to clean out nesting boxes built and put up to make up for the loss of decaying trees and other natural homes for cavity nesters. The bug-eating swallows and bluebirds will be showing up sooner than we might expect. And many birds, such as nuthatches, hang around all year. In the onslaught of bitter weather, they may take refuge in a nest box to sit out the storm.

If you're putting out feeders this winter for year-round resident birds, keep them clean and move them occasionally to reduce the chance of exposing ground feeders to disease from the molding leftovers that fall to the earth.

Always be mindful of placing feeders where they don't provide easy ambush points for free-running cats.

In addition to the seed feeders, put out suet feeders for the woodpeckers. Smear peanut butter occasionally in the bark of a pine tree trunk and watch the nuthatches and chickadees run the bark for the treat.

Link:
Beyond feeding: Birdwatchers create habitat in yards

Q. Could you tell me something about hardscape in the garden, and give me some suggestions for my small Somerville plot of land? Shelby A.S., Somerville

A. Hardscape is a term that refers to the permanent in-organic structures of a landscape such as walkways, patios, retaining walls, arbors, fences, or raised garden beds that are made with hard materials such as bricks, pavers, stone, cement or wood. The Softscape parts of the landscape are the living materials such as plants, grass, shrubs and trees.

Hardscaping helps to define the space. It adds interest, solid form, structure and contrasting texture. It also adds winter interest to the garden. Hardscapes like fountains, birdbaths, statues, benches or large rocks can be used as a focal point in the garden, giving ones eye a place to rest.

For any sized garden, particularly in an urban setting that has so much paved area already, you need to plan very carefully:

Consider the landscaping. Will you be hardscaping the entire area of your yard or just a part of it?

Research draining issues. Consider how the drainage will be affected with hardscape in place. Design the water runoff so it can be captured and used on site.

If you have children that will play in the yard, plan your hardscape with them in mind to keep them engaged in the landscape. Put in a small pond (not too deep) with fish, position large flat rocks or sections of a felled tree in the garden for hopping and climbing.

Create a focal point that your eye will travel to, such as a fountain, small weeping tree, or sculpture.

Q. What can we do in the Boston area that is garden related to help us feed our winter non-gardening woes? Todd & Phil, Belmont

Continued here:
Garden Q&A: Hardscapes and winter events

The history of the Vijayanagar empire, ruins of which now house Hampi, is dotted with several interesting episodes, some of which were dwelt upon by renowned architect-academic George Michell during a session at the Jaipur Literature festival on Monday.

Dr. Michell, an expert on Central Asian and Indian-especially Deccan-architecture, was introduced by historian-author William Dalrymple for a session titled Vijayanagar: the city of victory.

Dr. Michell received his training in architecture at Melbourne University and then went on to do a Ph.D in Indian Archaeology at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London.

He has undertaken research projects at different archaeological sites across India, including over two decades of intensive field work at Hampi. His recent publications include Vijayanagara: Splendour in Ruins, The Great Temple at Thanjavur and Mughal Architecture and Gardens, among several other books.

Dr. Michell said Vijayanagar was among the earliest and perhaps the most complete examples of magnificent imperial cities and one of the very few Indian cities that were abandoned.

Not unlike Pompeii (the ancient Roman city) which came to a sudden cataclysmic end in 78 AD, Vijayanagar came to a cataclysmic end in 1565...This was a city that was abandonedand there are not many Indian cities like that, said Dr. Michell.

The most amazing thing about the place, he said, was the landscape.

It is one of the most extraordinary landscapes to be found anywhere in Asia, not just in Indiaincredible granitic landscape... one question that most people ask us is what the hell is a big imperial city of one of the greatest Hindu empires in southern India doing here? Why did they build it here?

There are several possible explanations-one, this type of landscape was a very good natural defence against empires that were at war with Vijayanagar; second, a great river, Tungabhadra, runs through this placeand it loses height ideal for taking off water channels and creating a very extensive hydraulic systemwhich permitted the cultivation of many types of crops, said Dr. Michell.

He said the earliest Vijayanagar emperors-the Sangama kings-were sort of local nobodies who seized the moment in a power vacuumwhen the Delhi Sultans abandoned control of this part of India...giving an opportunity to these local people to use the Muslim threat in a sort of ideological political wayto galvanise everyone together.

The rest is here:
George Michell showcases interesting episodes of Vijayanagar