What they like

Summer, sun and a messy green edge. Shrubs, hedges, rough vegetation and above all: variety. Plant a hedgerow, tree belt or wide hedge with hawthorn, blackthorn, elder, hazel and wild rose. Leave stinging nettles, thistles and brambles in a corner. In parks or gardens: prefer a dense shrub area to a tidy lawn. On the farmstead and in agricultural areas: create uncultivated corners, mow ditch banks in phases and keep a few shrubs along the field.

Ecological importance

An insect hunter with speed. He takes caterpillars, beetles, flies and later in the summer also berries. Raises his young on insects—so where it buzzes, there they breeds.

When in the Netherlands

May through August. A migratory bird; they spends the winter far away.

Status

Not rare, but sensitive: less shrub growth and fewer insects quickly means fewer nightingales. Make it messy again. He likes that.