ABCDE saturday, august 28, 2010 WHERE WE LIVE HOMES FOR SALE Where everybody knows your name


Comfort and bargains help define Brookland


by Sadie Dingfelder Special to The Washington Post


Just a few miles northeast of the bustling center of downtown, the District has a neighborhood where the buzz of lawnmowers is more common than siren wails, Victorian homes perch on sprawl- ing lawns, and children sell lem- onade and oatmeal cookies. Brookland, with its suburban


proportions and quaint main street, has long been a haven for middle-class families, and it’s at- tracting a new generation of nest- ing young couples with do-it- yourself streaks, said Howard Politzer, owner of Brookland True Value Hardware. “What do you get when you go to Brookland? You get a house for under half a million dollars — maybe even two or three hundred thousand, a fixer-upper with a backyard, with three or four bed- rooms . . . close to a Metro stop, where there’s a nice little hard- ware store on the corner,” he said. A bargain on a four-bedroom bungalow lured Emily and Mat- thew Schilling to Brookland in 2003, but they didn’t plan to stay long. The neighborhood, they thought, was too dangerous to raise children — a fear fueled by a triple-murder in Colonel Brooks’ Tavern that year. But over time, they settled in, reviewed crime statistics and found the area to be relatively safe and child-friendly, Matthew Schilling said. “In the beginning, we were def- initely thinking short term: Renovate, sell, move, kid,” he said. “But then we were here a couple of years and discovered we had really great neighbors. Now


BROOKLAND


BOUNDARIES: Northeast’s Brookland is bordered by Michigan Avenue to the north, Rhode Island Avenue to the south, Ninth Street to the west and South Dakota Avenue to the east. SCHOOLS: Noyes Educational Campus, Burroughs Educational Campus and Brookland Education Campus at Bunker Hill for elementary and middle schools; Cardozo High School and Roosevelt High School. HOME SALES: In the past 12 months, 191 homes have sold or been under contract. Recently, 54 homes were on the market. Prices vary, averaging about $312,000, said Mary Hodges, a real estate agent with the Menkiti Group. WITHIN WALKING DISTANCE: Brookland Metro station, Rhode Island Metro station, Catholic University of America and a handful of businesses on 12th Street NE, including a Yes Organic


F R A N K L I N . T S


Detail NW


D.C. SW THE WASHINGTON POST


market, a CVS, a coffee shop, a few restaurants and a hardware store.


WITHIN 10 TO 20 MINUTES BY CAR: Downtown Washington, Washington Hospital Center, Reagan National Airport.


SADIE DINGFELDER FOR THE WASHINGTON POST


Each year, hundreds of people flock to the herb and plant sale at the Franciscan Monastery, above, to buy greenery. With its suburban proportions and quaint main street, right, Brookland has long been a haven for middle-class families.


we know everybody, and we feel comfortable here.” Like many Brooklanders, the Schillings have spent untold hours renovating their home and yard. They


$315,000 Market view for


Zip code 20017 Median sales price


May ’10 - July ’10 year over year


Nearby Zip codes


Hyattsville, 20782 Median sales price


painstakingly re-


moved layer after layer of paint from the oak molding that lines their windows and floors. They pulled pounds of weeds from their back yard, now a carpet of lush green grass, and planted flo- werbeds. They freed a crepe myr- tle tree from choking vines, and it sprung back to life, showering


$164,950 $450,000


Petworth, 20010 Median sales price


washingtonpost.com/realestate SOURCE:


See more homes at:


$594,900 6-bedroom 3-bath single-family home


$11,088 3.6%


Homes for sale in 20017


$424,999 3-bedroom 2-bath 1-partial bath single-family home


$529,500 5-bedroom 2-bath 1-partial bath single-family home


M.K. CANNISTRA/ 50 NE SE Arboretum Nat’l 1


Catholic Univ.


Brookland F R


GREEN SCENE For birds, let nature take its course by Joel M. Lerner


Anyone who reads Green Scene regularly probably knows my opinion about using bird feeders to attract feathered friends to our gardens. Once birds discover that the feeders are filled with their favorite foods, feeders are very effective for attracting flocks. The issue is that feeders don’t attract birds only — and that not all aviary species coexist peacefully. One way to control bullies is to add more bird feeders so that each winged variety has its own space. But, with the addition of more feeders, your yard becomes a collection of plastic tubes, metal boxes, wooden platforms, birdhouses and bare areas of lawn, detracting from the aesthetics of your landscape design. And starlings and wrens can arrive in hordes, taking away feeding space for other birds and emptying the feeders rapidly. Feeders kept full of tasty morsels such as berries, nuts, seeds — and the tender young chicks feeding on them — will also be appealing to cats, mice, rats, raccoons, chipmunks, deer, squirrels, owls, hawks, mockingbirds, crows and jays, most of them being predators, nuisances or at least bullies. My preference is to create a landscape design without bird feeders and install flora to attract different varieties of birds. In many situations, it’s best to let nature take its course and just enjoy the birds that are attracted to the natural food you plant for them. Here are 25 bird-attracting plants we like to include in our landscape designs:


Trees and shrubs


Doublefile viburnum (V. plicatum var. tomentosum) provides dense cover for shelter and maroon-colored fall berries for feeding before winter. Migrating and non-migrating birds count on these shrubs. Arrowwood viburnum (V. dentatum) is a native shrub with blackish-blue berries that cardinals, robins, starlings and woodpeckers depend on for creating shelter in summer and for food during September and October.


Linden viburnum (V.


PHOTOS BY SANDRA LEAVITT LERNER FOR THE WASHINGTON POST Blanketflower is a favorite of finches.


dilatatum) has horizontal branching habits that provide good nesting spaces and glossy red fruits that can persist into spring.


White oak (Quercus alba) and all other oaks that produce acorns are a favorite food for many birds and a desirable tree for nesting. Serviceberry (Amelanchier canadensis) produces very tasty berries that you will have to compete for as they ripen from purple to black if you want to make a pie that rivals blueberry in flavor. It is an important food for at least 19 species of woodland birds.


Common dogwood (Cornus


florida) berries become edible starting in August. Since the berries are eaten by more than 86 species of birds, they are usually completely consumed by November.


American holly (Ilex opaca) is


a native plant that offers food and excellent shelter for many birds, including mourning doves, jays, robins, flickers, bluebirds and mockingbirds. Winterberry holly (Ilex verticillata) is a handsome deciduous food source that feeds


many native birds in early winter and has showy red berries on its bare stems. Washington hawthorn


(Crataegus phaenopyrum) is a small, flowering tree that can grow to about 25 to 30 feet tall in full sun. It’s a thorny shelter for about 18 species of birds that nest in these trees until fall, when robins, cardinals, blue jays and cedar waxwings, among others, feast on their showy orange berries.


American beautyberry


(Callicarpa americana) provides food and water in the form of striking purple berries for about a dozen birds in the lightly shaded woodlands of the mid-Atlantic states. Red chokecherry (Aronia arbutifolia) will grow to about 2 to 3 feet high and 5 feet wide, providing red berries from late summer into late winter as a food source for cedar waxwing, brown thrasher and about 10 other feathered species. Inkberry holly (Ilex glabra)


naturalizes throughout the woodland in sun or shade. Its evergreen foliage and black berries are a good source of shelter and food for many birds.


Blueberry (Vaccinium corymbosum) has tasty berries on its reddish green stems in midsummer. The sweet blueberries are a challenge to protect from bluebirds, mockingbirds, robins, brown thrashers, woodpeckers and Carolina wrens, making it difficult to harvest some for your own use.


Perennials and annuals Blanketflower (Gaillardia


grandiflora) has this common name because of its tendency to drop seeds where it flowers and then blanket the planting bed with seedlings the following year, unless the finches get to the seed first. Purple coneflower (Echinacea


purpurea) flowers in late spring and summer and attracts goldfinches and native sparrows in midsummer when the purple flowers fade and their cone-shaped centers go to seed. Sunflower (Helianthus angustifolius) is the classic seed for bird feeders, but if planted in spring, the seed will create an impressive stand of sunflowers in summer and turn into bird feeders as the flowers fade and


the seed ripens in late summer. Morning glory (Ipomoea coccinea) is grown more as a screen for birds to hide in, preen and relax without fear of being attacked. It’s a good nectar flower for hummingbirds. Zinnia (Z. elegans) is an old-fashioned flower that has been used to attract seed-eating birds such as goldfinches, cardinals, chickadees and sparrows. Goldenrod (Solidago canadensis) isn’t only an outstanding plant for its late-summer yellow flowers; it also attracts goldfinches, sparrows and juncos, among other meadow and prairie seed-eating birds. Flax (Linum perenne) is a


goldfinch magnet. They love flaxseed as much as most birds like berries. Honeysuckle (Lonicera sulphurea) is one of the first plants that comes to mind when I think about attracting hummingbirds, but it also attracts catbirds, mockingbirds, robins, thrashers and thrushes. Plant only a native honeysuckle. Trumpet honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens) is my choice for attracting hummingbirds.


Purple gayflower (Liatris


spicata) is considered a favorite on our property for seed-eating birds because it produces a large quantity of seeds and flowers that open gradually over a long period during summer. Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia


fulgida) has a long flowering period and goes to seed as flowers fade from late August into September. The yellow flower color fades as the cone-shaped seed heads of these flowers blacken. Finches feed on them incessantly into fall. Beebalm (Monarda didyma) is


a favorite of hummingbirds because it has the perfect size tubular flowers for nectar feeding. This native plant is a good choice to mix with taller hummingbird-attracting plants like native honeysuckle and morning glory. Beardtongue (Penstemon digitalis ‘Huskers Red’) has red stems that are a complementary color to the green stems of other plants. It offers the bonus of small tubular flowers that hummingbirds can drink from. info@gardenlerner.com


Joel M. Lerner is president of Environ- mental Design in Capitol View Park.


Purple gayflower is a common plant for seed-eating birds.


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