Butterflies add surprise, beauty, color, and motion to
a garden. Why not invite them into your back yard? Planting a butterfly
garden not only attracts these beautiful creatures but is also a great way
for children to learn about the life cycle of butterflies and develop an
interest in nature.
Luring and maintaining a butterfly population requires
a full-sun gardens with nectar-producing plants for adult butterflies,
plants for caterpillar (larva) food, a shallow pool of water, and places
for butterflies to rest and shelter.
You need only a small space for a successful butterfly
habitat. Set your butterfly garden in a warm, sunny location. Fences or a
windbreak of shrubs or trees will protect butterflies from summer winds.
Butterflies need sunlight to warm their flight muscles. Flat stones or
boards placed in a sunny area of the garden will give them an ideal resting
site.
Attracting butterflies to your garden is a matter of
planting the right flowers. Sweet, pungent, or highly fragrant blooms;
colors such as red, purple, orange, yellow, and pink; and simple, tubular,
and open flowers are some of the characteristics of a plant that will
attract butterflies. Make sure your garden includes an assortment of plants
for continuous blooms. Bloom duration, time of flowering, plant size, and
flower color are all important considerations. The best choices are native
prairie, wetland, and woodland plants.
Before you design your butterfly garden, familiarize
yourself with the life cycles and food preferences of the butterflies in
your area. Don’t forget that a butterfly isn’t always a
butterfly—it spends its early life as a caterpillar. To make your
garden a home for butterflies, you need to feed the caterpillars, too. Each
species of butterfly has its preferred adult and larval food. An adult
butterfly will spend several hours selecting a specific leaf on a plant
that will be the best for its offspring.
Adult butterflies feed only on liquids. Large masses
of one plant are best for attracting butterflies. Although butterflies are
drawn by both color and scent, they have a difficult time picking out
individual flowers. Native plants that provide nectar sources for
butterflies include butterfly weed, aster, joe-pye weed, goldenrod, phlox,
ironweed, coneflower, redbud, and sumac. Butterflies are also attracted to
dandelion, clover, native honeysuckle, milkweed, thistle, bee balm,
butterfly bush, sedum, and alfalfa. Some butterflies find nourishment in
overripe fruit, fermenting sap flows, animal dung, bird droppings, and
honeydew.
Caterpillars eat leaves and sometimes flower and
seeds. Often picky eaters, they may feed only on a specific plant or group
of plants. Plants desirable to butterfly larvae include butterfly weed,
dill, fennel, parsley, clover, alfalfa, milkweed, thistle, Queen
Anne’s lace, violet, and aster. The trees and shrubs preferred by
larvae are elm, willow, poplar, birch, hackberry, apple, cherry, ash,
spicebush, lilac, and tulip tree. Most plants will tolerate some
caterpillar feeding without a noticeable decrease in flowering or fruiting.
A clay saucer makes a great receptacle for a shallow
pool of water. Cover the bottom of the saucer with sand and add a rack or
twig to provide a resting place for butterflies. Or try burying a shallow
lid in the ground and filling it with mixture of sand and soil, then
periodically saturating the mixture with water.
Because caterpillars and butterflies are sensitive to
pesticides, you should avoid using these chemicals in and around your
butterfly garden. Not only will your butterfly visitors be safer, but
you’ll also reap the benefit of learning to live without pesticides.
Butterfly resource
The Field Guide to Butterflies of Illinois, written
by John Bouseman and James Sternburg, contains descriptions and photos of
butterflies found in Illinois, as well as their preferred food sources and
habitats.
This book is available from the Illinois Natural
History Survey, 217-333-6880.
This article appears in May 19-25, 2005.
