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Audubon Native Plants for Birds by ZIP Code

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Audubon Native Plants for Birds by ZIP Code

Extract native plants data from Audubon's "Plants for Birds" database by US ZIP code. For each ZIP, returns the native plants Audubon recommends to support local bird populations — including the bird families attracted, wildlife resources provided (caterpillar host, nectar, fruit, seeds), and plant characteristics.

This actor provides a unique zip → native plant → bird habitat value join that is not available elsewhere as a structured data feed.

Features

  • Accepts a list of ZIP codes or uses the full ~33,700 US ZCTA universe
  • Extracts all plants for each ZIP code, following pagination automatically
  • Returns bird family groups attracted by each plant and wildlife resources provided
  • Includes location context (city, state, total plant count) per ZIP
  • Respects maxItems to limit output size
  • Polite crawling: no proxy, no captcha, server-rendered HTML

Input

Parameter Type Description Default
zipcodes array List of 5-digit US ZIP codes. Leave empty to process all ~33K ZCTAs ["90210", "10001", "60601"]
maxItems integer Maximum number of plant records to return 50

Example input:

{
  "zipcodes": ["90210", "10001", "98101"],
  "maxItems": 100
}

Output

One record per native plant per ZIP code:

Field Type Description
zipcode string 5-digit US ZIP code queried
location string City, state, ZIP (e.g. "Los Angeles, CA, 90210")
state string US state abbreviation
total_plants_for_zip integer Total native plants Audubon recommends for this ZIP
common_name string Common name of the plant
scientific_name string Scientific/Latin name
plant_type string Plant type (e.g. SHRUBS, ANNUALS/PER., TREES)
bird_value string Wildlife resources provided (Caterpillars, Nectar, Fruit, Seeds, Butterflies)
bird_species_supported string Comma-separated bird family groups attracted
num_bird_species integer Count of bird family groups attracted
audubon_plant_url string URL to the plant detail page on Audubon.org
source string "Audubon Native Plants for Birds"

Example output record:

{
  "zipcode": "90210",
  "location": "Los Angeles, CA, 90210",
  "state": "CA",
  "total_plants_for_zip": 26,
  "common_name": "Cobwebby Thistle",
  "scientific_name": "Cirsium occidentale",
  "plant_type": "ANNUALS/PER.",
  "bird_value": "Butterflies, Caterpillars, Nectar, Seeds",
  "bird_species_supported": "Waxwings, Orioles, Mockingbirds & Thrashers, Cardinals & Grosbeaks, Sparrows",
  "num_bird_species": 5,
  "audubon_plant_url": "https://www.audubon.org/native-plants/species/cobwebby-thistle",
  "source": "Audubon Native Plants for Birds"
}

Use Cases

  • Habitat-gardening apps: power plant recommendations by location with bird attraction data
  • Conservation-landscaping nonprofits: bulk export of native plant recommendations by geography
  • Native-plant nurseries: enrich catalog/leads by ZIP with bird habitat value metadata
  • GIS / ecology analytics: zip-keyed native-plant × bird-ecology dataset for spatial analysis
  • AI garden assistants: training data combining plant taxonomy with bird habitat benefit by region

Notes

  • Source: Audubon Society Native Plants for Birds database
  • Data reflects Audubon's ecoregion-based recommendations for each ZIP code
  • Pagination is handled automatically; large ZIP batches can produce thousands of records
  • The bundled ZIP list uses Census 2023 ZCTA definitions (~33,700 ZIP codes)
  • Some ZIP codes return 0 plants (military, territories, unassigned); those are silently skipped
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