Attracting Butterflies to Your Backyard
The first step to attracting Butterflies to your garden is to plant flowers with nutritious nectar. Butterflies and plants are dependent on each other. The plants provide nectar and in return are pollinated by visiting butterflies. Therefore, native plants are the best choice for guaranteed butterfly presence. Adults searching for nectar are attracted to red, yellow, pink, orange or purple blossoms that are flat-topped or clustered and have short tubes which allow the butterflies to reach the nectar.
It is important to avoid using pesticides as these will kill butterflies in both the adult and larvae stage.
Nectar producing plants should be grown in a sunny area away or protected from strong winds. Butterflies need sun to orientate and to warm their wings. Flat stones in garden are places for butterflies to rest in the sun. Male butterflies gather in damp areas and shallow puddles to drink water and extract salt.
The adult like span averages 6 to 20 days, with range from a few days to over six months. Butterflies need nectar throughout their adult life span, so plant for a continuous bloom.
Nectar Plants
Aster, Butterfly Weed, Ironweed, Azaleas, Purple Coneflower, Buttonbush, Sumacs, Joe-pye-weeds, Bergernots, Milkweeds, Black-eyed Susan, Phlox, Cardinal Flower, Sunflowers, Ceanothus, Sweet Pepperbush, Coreopsis, Verbena, Goldenrod, Blazing Stars, Butterfly Bush and Pickerlweed.
Caterpillar Food Sources
In order to insure that butterflies will live in your garden instead of just passing through you should include host plants in your landscape. Do not panic when you see chewed foliage, usually no permanent damage is done.
Host Plants
Acmon Blue, Anice Swallowtail, American Painted Lady, Baltimore Checkerspot, Banded Hairstreak, Black Swallowtail, Buckeye, Cabbage White, Checkered White, Checkered Skipper, Cloudless Sulphur, Common Snooty-wing, Common Wood-nymph, Dogface, Dreamy Dusky Wing, Eastern Tailed Blue, Field Crescent, Giant Swallowtail, Goatweed Butterfly, Gray Comma, Gray Hairstock, Great Spangled Fritillary, Hackberry Butterfly, Hoary Edge, Large Marble, Little Copper, Long tailed Skipper, Monarch, Morning Cloak, Painted Lady, Pine White, Pygmy Blue, Red Admiral, White Admiral, Pipe vine Swallowtail, Question Mark, Reakirts Blue, Roadside Skipper, Sachem, Snout Butterfly, Spicebush Swallowtail, Spring Azure, Sulphurs, Tawny Emperor, Two-tailed Swallowtail, Variegated Fritillary, Viceroy, Western Tailed Blue, Western White, Woodland Skipper, Zebra and Zebra Swallowtail.
Cathy’s website The Garden Room is dedicated to garden lovers. Providing gardeners with the most fabulous Garden Accessories including Angels, Birdbaths, Birdfeeders, Windchimes and more. Cathy has been an avid gardener for the last 20 years and has taken many courses on gardening including completing the Master Gardener Program. Her garden was chosen in 2000 for the local Garden Walk out of hundreds of gardens in the area. She especially loves accenting the garden with stones, fountains, angels and water features.
[tags]Butterfly, gardening, gardens, flowers[/tags]