Butterfly Gardens
Living on a farm, surrounded by a variety of wild plants, the butterflies have seemed to me to do just fine and didn't need special butterfly gardens. They flit about, lay eggs and as long as the larvae do not decimate my garden plants, we get along just fine. I was however reminded that not all of you are so fortunate as to live in the country so I thought I might pass along a few tips on keeping and attracting butterflies - how to create butterfly gardens.
To begin, butterflies will visit and stay if they are given the essentials of life. Their requirements are not much different than our own: a variety of plants for food and shelter, some moisture and an absence of pesticides.
This is one creature that will quickly come if you provide the appropriate conditions in your butterfly gardens.
Butterfly larvae are ugly!
Let us be very clear here, butterfly larvae are ugly caterpillars that eat plants. Eat is perhaps a mild word for what these multilegged predators do to plants ravage is closer to the truth. If you have ever watched a parsleyworm devour your carrots, parsley or Queen Annes Lace, youll know exactly what I mean. A single worm can strip a planting almost overnight. This caterpillar will shed its skin 4 to 6 times as it grows large enough to pupate into a butterfly and when big enough, it will spin a hard chrysalis and immobilize itself on the host plant until it is ready to emerge to enter our dreams and hearts as a Swallowtail butterfly.
Now, we all love the Swallowtail but you have to have the worm before it turns. Get used to having ugly caterpillars around if you want the beauty of flitting fairies in your butterfly gardens.
In many ways, it is fortunate that butterfly larvae like really weedy plants. This means they are rarely attracted to or chow down on the good plants in our gardens. However, unless you choose to grow the weeds for larvae food, you wont have the ensuing butterflies. If you have a corner of your garden to donate to science and preserving butterfly life consider planting some or all of the following plants:
Wild Asters
Clover
Hollyhocks
Lupines
Mallows
Marigolds
Milkweed
Nettles and Thistles
Parsley
Passionflower (in baskets)
Plantain
Snapdragons
Sorrel
Turtlehead
Violets
These plants in butterfly gardens will keep the larvae happy and growing well. Do not pick only one of these plants to install in your garden. Butterfly larvae love to eat them all and the more kinds you have, the more likely it is that you will successfully attract these lovely insects.
Encourage the above plants to self-sow and give you a small weedy section at the back of your garden - it is these weedy butterfly gardens that attract and maintain these beautiful creatures.
You might consider encouraging your neighbours to plant some larvae food as well and if each of you donated a touching back corner of your yards, you would have a much larger space in one area for the larvae to feed and be protected. If you could convince several adjoining neighbours to put a few plants in both back corners and along the backs of the garden, you could create an environmental "butterfly gardens" sanctuary joined by alleyways for butterflies and other wildlife such as birds.
I note that these larvae weeds do not have to be prominent, they can be tucked at the rear of gardens behind the really attractive garden plants. Back there, they are out of sight and out of mind until the butterflies come winging over to join you for evening drinks.
Attracting female butterflies
Attracting female butterflies in the first place is as simple as encouraging these weeds to grow and providing a source of water. The best source is a mud puddle. In this way, the insect gets the moisture she needs while also obtaining needed minerals. Sink a shallow but wide dish the plastic top from a garbage can is ideal into the soil and fill it up with the excavated soil. Keep this dish mud-puddled to bring in the butterflies in droves.
Alternately, you could dig a basin sized hole and line it with plastic a plastic garbage bag would work well fill in the lined depression with the excavated soil and water. There is no need for drainage holes in this mud puddle, we want wet mud not drainage so top up the water every second day or so.
In our gardens, we regularly see butterflies at the bog garden area seemingly sitting on the ground but in reality getting a much-needed drink. Butterflies will visit sites that are in full sun and sheltered from winds.
Flowering shrubs are great for their roosting needs and the more fragrant the plant the better.
Garden plants for adult butterflies in the butterfly gardens include...
Asters
Joe-Pye weed
Black-eyed Susans
Lantana
Butterfly Bush
Butterfly Weed
Liatris
Pentas
Coreopsis
Purple Coneflowers.
Remember that adult butterfly needs are different than the larval forms
Now, we all know of our beloved Monarch butterfly that flies south to overwinter. This of course simply proves that this insect is a true Canadian!
Most of the rest of the species we see stay right here with the rest of us. This means they are overwintering on that weedy trash or brush pile of the butterfly gardens and if you mow or prune the weeds for the winter, you are removing the insects from your garden.
Think natural here. Do not clean up the butterfly area of the garden. Leave any brush or piles of weeds in place for the winter. The rougher the better as far as butterfly survival is concerned.
How do you know a good caterpillar from a bad one?
A rough rule of thumb is that the good ones are more solitary than the bad ones.
If you see a nest of tent caterpillars (bad ones) then opening up the nest for the birds or flaming them with a propane torch (I tape mine to the end of a hockey stick to reach higher nests) eliminates these tree predators.
Cabbage butterflies (small white ones) lay hundreds of eggs that hatch into small green caterpillars that devastate cole crops and sometimes roses and garden plants. Handpick and stomp these guys or dust with rotenone or diatomaceous earth. I know that some will not agree with this selective killing in the butterfly gardens but I am first a gardener and there doesn't seem to be any shortage of the pest forms of butterflies.
Most of the rest will be beneficial. If you only see one or two caterpillars eating a good plant in your butterfly gardens, dont kill them. Instead, try moving them to a more weedy specimen. In this way, both the plant and the caterpillar get to light up your life later in the gardening season.
Butterfly gardens are indeed a wonderful thing to create, especially in the urban garden where these delightful insects can light up an afternoon by flitting from plant to plant.
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