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With a little time and some simple tools, you can create a welcoming home for your feathered friends and their families.

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  Step 1: Find store

  Birdhouses are sold at lots of different places—hardware stores, pet stores, and gardening stores are the likeliest bets. Find a store that you know will have a good-sized stock and a wide selection.

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  Step 2: Choose wood

  Make a beeline for the wood houses. The best choice will be a house made of durable cedar or cypress, and will have a rough surface, which gives birds a foothold as they enter and exit the house.

• Tip

  Make sure the interior of the house is untreated and unpainted. Chemical fumes can harm birds—and anyway, birds don’t give a hoot about interior decoration.

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  Step 3: Choose the right roof

  Choose a house with an angled roof, so that predators can’t sit on it—they could spook Mom and Dad into leaving home. And avoid metal, which attracts too much heat.

• Tip

  Never use a birdhouse with a perch below the entrance hole. Predators may perch _themselves_ on it and wait for the birds inside to come out.

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  Step 4: Carve grooves

  After bringing your new birdhouse home, use a whittling knife or sharp penknife to carve grooves below the entrance hole on the inside and outside of the house. This will provide added traction for little bird toes.

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  Step 5: Ventilate

  It doesn’t need air conditioning, but be sure your birdhouse is well ventilated. If they aren’t there already, drill small holes along the edges of the top walls.

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  Step 6: Allow for drainage

  If the birdhouse needs them, you should also drill small holes in the corners and middle of the bottom, to allow drainage and keep the nest aired out.

• Tip

  Lightly rubbing the inside of the birdhouse with a bar of soap will help repel insects.

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  Step 7: Check entrance hole

  Make sure the entrance hole in the house is large enough for the birds in your neighborhood to come and go comfortably. If not, get out your trusty knife and perform some more repair work.

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  Step 8: Hang

  Hang your birdhouse in a safe, cat-free spot and start watching to see when your new tenants move in! When the season is over, clean out the birdhouse and save it for next spring.

• Fact

  Ostriches, which can weigh up to 300 pounds, lay their eggs in a communal nest scraped into the ground.