Garden Gate e-notes » butterflies

Butterfly container garden

dgruca — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 17:01:05 +0000

butterfly container garden

Want to bring in the butterflies? Create a garden using plants they love. The butterflies will flock to the “buffet” selection of flowers. And you’ll like the fact that many of the plants are easy-care, long-blooming perennials. Most any yard has a spot where you can tuck in a butterfly bed. If yours doesn’t, or you already have a big butterfly garden, but you’d like to draw a few winged visitors closer to the deck or patio, containers are the solution. That way you’ll be able to watch them up close and personal.

While butterflies will visit almost any flower looking for food, they are more attracted to some plants. Those are the ones to use in a container. You’ll want to choose flowers that have lots of nectar, a butterfly’s favorite food. That’s why we’ve included aster, lantana, purple coneflower and black-eyed Susan. Add a canna in the center for some height and bold texture. This guarantees your container will look good to both you and hungry butterflies!

Check out the plant list and planting plan for this container in our Web extra!

Butterfly bush

dgruca — Tue, 28 Aug 2007 16:01:48 +0000

butterfly bush
buddleja davidii

If there’s one plant that should be in every butterfly garden, this is it. Its fragrant spikes of pink, purple or white flowers will draw in almost any passing butterfly.

Butterfly bush can grow tall and lanky. But you can keep it looking neater and blooming at a height where you’ll enjoy watching the visiting butterflies. Simply cut it back to 6 to 12 in. each spring and it’ll still reach 3 to 5 ft. or more by midsummer and bloom beautifully. Wait to cut until you see some signs of new growth. Be patient. You may have lots of perennials up and blooming before butterfly bush decides to finally show its silvery gray foliage.

TYPE Shrub or woody perennial SIZE 3 to 10 ft. tall and wide BLOOM Purple, pink, white and yellow in mid- to late summer LIGHT Full sun SOIL Well drained PESTS None serious HARDINESS Cold: USDA zones 5 to 9 Heat: AHS zones 9 to 1

Starflower

dgruca — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 16:01:17 +0000

starflower
pentas lanceolata

Once starflower starts to bloom, nothing stops it until frost. Like many butterfly plants, this one prefers, in fact needs, heat to bloom its best. So there’s no point setting it out into your garden until all danger of frost is past.

If you have limited space for your butterfly garden, maybe only room for a container or two, plant starflower in those containers. Prune it back if it starts to get too big — it’ll bloom again in just a few weeks. You won’t need to worry about keeping this plant tidy. The spent flowers turn green rather than brown so you may not even notice them against the foliage. And later the heads drop off all by themselves.

TYPE Annual SIZE 15 to 18 in. tall by 18 in. wide BLOOM Pink, red or white in summer LIGHT Full sun SOIL Well drained PESTS Occasional aphids and spider mites HARDINESS Cold: USDA zone 12 (treat as an annual elsewhere) Heat: AHS zones 12 to 1