SOME TREES WILL LURE BIRDS.

A recently received e-mail should be of interest to anyone with a shade garden and a love for avian creatures.

Q: I am planning to relandscape a portion of my yard, which, because of several sycamore and elm trees, has lots of shade in the summer and lots of sun (south) in the winter. The soil is claylike, but I'll be amending it. Can you recommend shrubs and perennials that attract birds and will grow in these conditions?

- Alan Pollack

A: The only plant I know of that will definitely tolerate shade and clay soil, and that will also attracts birds, is abelia.

Abelia deserves wider use on account of its petite, glossy leaves and delicate tubular flowers. It has an arching growth habit that gives it character as a stand-alone shrub, but it can also be used as a background, screen or hedge plant, growing up to 8 feet in height. Its leaves turn bronze-red in late fall.

Abutilon or flowering maple is another shrub you should consider. It grows in a broad spectrum of sun and shade exposures and does not require perfectly drained soil. Hummingbirds take special delight in its lantern-shaped flowers, which are available in white, yellow, wine red, pink and orange. With abutilon, you will have to be constantly on the lookout for scale insects, which are carried to its stems and young leaves by ants. When you see a trail of ants going up an abutilon shrub, you will find that it invariably leads to a colony of scales.

If you can decompact your clay soil somewhat and keep your trees moderately thinned out, you will significantly broaden the palette of bird-attracting plants that will grow in your yard. Plants that can grow in partial shade and that will bring in the birds include: honeysuckle, night- blooming jasmine (Cestrum nocturnum), rosemary, toyon and currant. Evergreen currant (Ribes viburnifolium) is a shade-tolerant California native with pink flowers and red fruit. It is also known as Catalina perfume, owing to its leaves, which exude a pleasant fragrance after it rains.

In a yard such as yours, where deciduous trees make for a sunny winter and a shady spring, you will also want to find plants that flower in the first few months of the year. Such plants will have utilized winter's sun to form flower buds that open up in February, March or April. Primroses, sold as annuals but capable of living for several years if kept free of snails, are excellent for growing under deciduous trees.

Kalanchoe, the succulent plant sold by florists with red, pink, orange or yellow flowers, is another excellent choice.

The best flowers of all for growing under deciduous trees are those that develop from bulbs, many of which (such as daffodil and narcissus) originated in temperate forests. Now is the time of year to start planning for bulbs, as they will be appearing in nurseries by the end of this month.

Snowflake (Leucojum) is probably the easiest and fastest-spreading bulb for naturalizing under deciduous trees. Snowflake has an extremely long bloom period for a bulb, opening bell-shaped white flowers as early as fall and continuing to do so throughout winter and spring.

Since you mention sycamores, you might be interested in the names of some ``effective companion plants for sycamores'' found in Philip Chandler's book, ``Reference Lists of Ornamental Plants for Southern California Gardens'' (Southern California Horticultural Society publication).

Included in this list are the orange-flowered lion's ear (Leonotis Leonurus), the yellow-flowered flannel bush (Fremontodendron) and Jerusalem sage (Phlomis fruticosa), rockrose (Cistus), angel's trumpet (Brugmansia) and Iochroma cyaneum, this last shrub famous for its tubular purple flowers.

The California sycamore (Platanus racemosa) will forever remain the most compelling landscape tree for our area. Its twisting trunks and limbs, mottled and peeling bark, sweetly hypnotic musky fragrance, maple leaves, and soft and fuzzy seed puffs make the California sycamore a tree you cannot help but love.

TIP OF THE WEEK: Anthracnose is a fungus endemic to California sycamores. It causes leaves to turn crispy brown in the fall, or even sooner, but is not a danger to the tree's long-term health. Spraying to curb the growth of this fungus is not advisable. The fungus-affected leaves will eventually fall off, to be replaced by fresh green leaves in the spring.