Because of their beauty and usefulness it is a delight to have finches in the area. One way to assure their presence is to plant trees, shrubs, vines, garden and groundcover plants that bear fruits, seeds and berries that they like. Since they like lots of different things, you have lots of choices in planting. There are, however, some plants that are absolute favorites:
| Hangout Plants for Finches | ||
|---|---|---|
| Alder | viburnum | asters |
| Birch | mulberry | blanket flowers |
| Dogwood | black-eyed Susans | Thistle |
| Maple | zinnias | sunflowers |
| Cosmos | ninebark | coneflowers |
| Pine | hawthorn | |
The trick with flowers is to let them dry and develop seeds. Most gardening books rec-ommend deadheading, or removing faded flowers from plants such as zinnias to encourage new blooms and to keep the plant looking good. If you intend to attract finches to your property, al-low at least some of the blooms to age and wither. The ray petals will fall off and the centers will darken and enlarge as the seeds within mature. This is what finches love. If you are particularly fond of goldfinches you can intrigue the neighbors by drying weeds such as goldenrod, milk-weed, dandelions, chicory, and thistle and make them available to your golden friends.
