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Butterfly Gardens

Butterfly pollinating purple coneflower

Purple Coneflower

Photo credit: Lynn Betts, NRCS

Butterfly on Wild Bergamot, Ratibida Pinnata (yellow flowers) and Prairie Flowers

Photo credit: Anna Vitale

A summer garden filled with colorful blooms is a delight to our eyes, but it’s also an enticement to gorgeous butterflies looking for a drink of nectar to fuel their short, intense lives.

Butterflies are spectacular and beautiful and they’re easy to please. They require little more than a few favorite plants, a place to bask in the sun and some water.

Most butterflies live for just a few weeks, continually on the lookout for flowering plants for life-sustaining nectar. They’re important pollinators, picking up pollen grains as they sip and making a transfer at their next floral stop. A key to greater butterfly diversity in the garden is to include a wider variety of plants. Many butterflies will flock to a bed of bright zinnias but native plants amplify the attraction.

Another key is to appeal to more stages of the butterfly lifecycle. Where butterflies are nectar generalists, their caterpillars are picky, feeding on the leaves of only one kind (or a few kinds) of plant.

The most successful butterfly gardens offer blooms from early spring to late fall. Flat stones or bricks placed in a sunny spot are welcomed by these cold-blooded creatures for basking. And butterflies appreciate shelter from wind, since it’s difficult for them to cling to flower heads in buffeting breezes.

Butterflies are vulnerable to any insect deterrents we use on yard and garden. The less you resort to chemicals or bacterial controls, the more butterflies you’ll see.

Here are some tips for attracting butterflies to your backyard:

  • Butterflies in the backyard
  • Add food plants for caterpillars.
  • Plan for a succession of blooms from spring through fall.
  • Include native plants in your garden.
  • Emphasize red, yellow, orange and purple colors and single blossoms (as opposed to doubles).
  • Place butterfly gardens in full sun.
  • Create sheltered areas to reduce wind.
  • Provide water in a shallow dish or birdbath for drinking.
  • Provide basking stones in full sun.
  • Create “puddling” sites with damp soil or sand to provided males with minerals.
  • Check out the North American Butterfly Association web site for useful information.
  • Take a look at Books for Butterfliers

— Val Cunningham