Butterfly Gardens
Viceroy butterfly on calibrachoa |
Gardeners generally love butterflies
(well except for the few who actually damage our garden plants) and want to
attract more butterflies to the garden. There are some interesting and
beautiful moths that are also fun to watch.
It’s more than choosing plants for butterflies and moths to sip nectar
from; it’s also about providing plants for them to lay their eggs on and their
caterpillars to eat.
All butterflies and moths lay eggs
that turn into caterpillars, which then spin a pupae case or cocoon and then
emerge from that as a butterfly. The
caterpillars or larval stage of butterflies and moths can be very destructive because
they will be feeding on the plant they hatch on and maybe others nearby. However
only a few species of butterflies and moths cause long term damage or death to
their host plants. Adult butterflies and
moths don’t live very long, a few months at most. They usually don’t cause any damage and are
helpful pollinators of many plants.
You don’t have to plant only native
plants to attract butterflies and moths.
While there are a few specialists who only prefer one “host” plant (the
plant they lay eggs on) many butterflies accept several host plants and most
visit a number of plants for nectar.
Some of our butterflies are themselves introduced species so they are
flexible in food and egg laying resources.
When glancing through any butterfly and moth identification guide you’ll
often notice that many of the plants that they prefer to get nectar from or lay
eggs on are non-native, common weeds or garden flowers.
Many butterflies prefer flowers that
have flat surfaces, or have short nectar tubes although a few butterflies and
moths are drawn to flowers with long tubes. Butterflies and moths seem drawn to colorful,
bright flowers like yellow, orange, red and pink. Some also like purple or blue flowers. Scent
in flowers is not as important as it is for bees. Night flying moths prefer
white flowers. Some butterflies and moths don’t eat at all as adults, some only
sip at mineral enriched mud, some prefer rotten fruit or sap, and some are even
carnivorous. And even in this advanced
scientific world we don’t know what nectar plants and host plants that some of
the rarer species of butterflies and moths prefer.
You probably won’t be able to
attract all the butterflies and moths that exist in your state to your garden,
because some butterflies and moths prefer plants that themselves like to grow
in a specialized environment like a bog or beach. And some butterflies and moths may actually
be unwelcome on your property, like the pretty sphinx moth who lays eggs on
your tomatoes that turn into ugly tomato hornworms and the cabbage butterfly
who lays eggs on your cabbage and broccoli that turn into little green cabbage
worms. But many gardeners do want to attract as many kinds of non-harmful
butterflies and moths as possible.
When you want to attract butterflies
and moths to your garden you should provide colorful nectar flowers in larger
patches of the same color, rather than as individual dots of color here and
there. Host plants for caterpillars
should also be in patches. One large
buddleia can provide a good patch of color but for maximum attraction you’d
want to plant a lot of marigolds for example, of about the same color.
Butterflies seem to prefer flowers
in the sun, although they sometimes visit shade flowers. A patch of mud, especially with a little
manure mixed in, and some soft fruit like a mushy banana, a slice of melon,
soft strawberries on a plate somewhere can increase the number of species
attracted to your garden. But beware
soft fruit can attract bees and hornets as well as flies.
Butterfly feeders also exist in
which you place sugar water like a hummingbird feeder but they are not that
effective in attracting butterflies and will attract a lot of bees, hornets and
ants too. It’s probably best to stay
natural with plants.
There are some plants that will attract
the maximum number of harmless butterflies and moths in a list below. These are plants that a number of species use. Some may be both nectar sources for adult
butterflies and moths and host plants for caterpillars. A good identification guide will often tell
you if a rare species of butterfly or moth has been seen in your county and
what host and nectar plants it prefers.
You may be able to add these plants to your garden also.
If you wish to attract butterflies
and moths you’ll have to decide if you are willing to tolerate some plants that
are considered weeds and that may not be very attractive to the human eye. You can choose only pretty garden flowers but
that will limit what species are attracted.
One idea is to let one area of your property grow the weedy plants,
maybe one that can be hidden a bit.
Plants that might attract
butterflies or moths but those butterflies or moths would be unwelcome, such as
cabbage, aren’t mentioned. Try to add as
many of the listed plants to your garden as possible, remember patches of the
same plant are better than singles. The plants on the list below are chosen for
Michigan and surrounding states but many are good for other places as well.
Butterfly
plants
Anise hyssop
Asters, native species and cultivars
Baby’s breath
Monarch on milkweed |
Bee balm- monarda, all kinds-
bergamot
Bearberry
Beech
Beggars Ticks- bidens- any kind
Black eyed Susans, rudbeckia species
Blackberries
Blueberries
Black cherry, choke cherries
Black locust
Bog rosemary (Andromeda glacophylla)
Boneset
Buddleia
Burdock
Buttonbush- Cephalanthus
occidentalis
Calibrachoa (Million bells)
Campion
Catnip
Ceanothus sanquineus (wild lilac)
Cheese mallow
Clovers of all kinds- gardeners may
want some of the ornamental crimson/reds
Columbine, all kinds
Crown vetch
Currants
Daisies of any kind, wild and
domestic
Dandelions
Dill
Dogbane
Fireweed
Fleabane
Grasses- native and non-native,
bluestem, bentgrass, Bermuda, beardgrass, lovegrass, panic grass and others –
many butterflies, skippers and moths that favor grasses are pretty but pests.
Goldenrod
Gooseberry
Hawkweed, orange and yellow
Hollyhocks
Honey locust
Honeysuckle, native and non-native
Hops
Iris versicolor
Ironweed
Joe Pye Weed
Knapweed
Knotweed
Labrador Tea
Lambsquarters
Lantana
Leadplant
Lobelia
Lupines
Pearly everlasting
Phlox, both native species and
domesticated cultivars
Pigweed
Plantain
Mapleleaf viburnum
May apple
Milkweed- Butterfly weed- ascleplias
any kinds
Mints of any type
Mustard/rape, Brassica kaber
Nettles (Urtica species)
New Jersey tea
Oaks – native species
Oregano
Passionflower
Paw Paw
Prickly Pear cactus
Privet
Purple loosestrife (yes many
butterflies like it)
Purslane
Queen Anne’s Lace
Redbud
Rockcress
Sassafras
Self-heal
Senna (cassia)
Sheep sorrel (Rumex)
Shrubby cinguefoil (Potentilla) all
kinds
Spicebush
Staghorn sumac, other sumacs
St. Johns wort
Strawberries, all kinds
Sunflowers, all kinds
Teasel
Tickseed
Toadflax
Thistles, bull, Russian, all kinds
Vervain
Vetches, all kinds
Violets, all kinds
Wild plum, Prunus americana
Willows
White pine
Wisteria, native or Chinese
Yarrow- all types
Zinnias
This is not a complete list of all
the plants that butterflies utilize.
Many tropical plants put outside in summer also attract them and many
other annuals and perennial flowers get at least some attention from them. A colorful garden with a variety of species
and letting the garden edges go a little wild will do wonders to attract
butterflies and moths.
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