Planting a Butterfly Garden
A butterfly garden is an easy way to both see more butterflies and to contribute towards their conservation, since many natural butterfly habitats have been lost to urbanization and other developments. It is easy to increase the number and variety of butterflies in your yard by planting both plants that the butterflies eat the nectar of as well as those that are hospitable to the caterpillars of the butterflies.
A butterfly garden isn’t the typical UK type of garden, however it is becoming more popular to offer some native food and habitat for the butterflies that are native to the UK, such as the British lepidoptera.
British Lepidoptera, becoming more rare here
Although we love to see the butterflies, we often don’t give a thought to the fact that we could attract them to our gardens just by including certain types of plants that the butterflies use both to lay their eggs and to eat.
When we plant a butterfly garden, be fully prepared for the fact that there will be some heavy eating on the plants that you’ve planted there.
The smaller caterpillars which are the first stage of the butterflies can’t travel far on their own, and will munch steadily on the plants that you’ve provided, because the female butterfly locates and lays her eggs on the variety of plants that her young will needs as food.
Most varieties of butterfly and caterpillar are very specific about the kind of plant they can use as food. If the eggs are not placed on the correct plant the caterpillar that hatches will not survive to become the butterfly.
The milk parsley plant bears delicate flowers that feed the butterflies
Many gardeners avoid planting for butterflies because they don’t like to see plants in their garden that have been eaten by the caterpillars.
To prevent this type of thing, you may want to locate your butterfly garden a bit away from the rest of your planting, in an area that isn’t greatly visible to passers by.
Many native trees and other plants found in and around our yards are host plants for caterpillars. There are a variety of plants that can be included in a butterfly garden that are excellent host plants in our area, and will attract certain types of butterflies to the garden.
The caterpillars alone will eat the plants while the butterflies will simply sip the nectar and enhance the beauty of the garden..The most important part of a butterfly garden, will be the kinds of plants and flowers that will attract the butterflies and serve them well as food, or nectar.
A butterfly garden is a remarkably easy way to see more of the butterflies that we all love and to help toward saving their environment and help deal with some natural habitat issues caused by the urbanization of nearly every country on earth.
Old World Swallowtail
According to the National Fact Sheet:
“Britain currently has 57 resident native butterflies and six or so that visit us regularly from abroad and which breed if conditions are right. Very few butterflies are as common as they once were. More and more of Britain is being built over with concrete. Hedgerows are torn out, along with all the wild flowers that grow beneath them. Roadside verges are kept neatly trimmed so few plants can ever come to flower.
Open woodland is replaced by closely planted coniferous trees, beneath which little can survive. Wetlands are drained and ‘reclaimed’ for agriculture. Those plants that survive to provide food for the butterfly larva or imago are classed as ‘weeds’ and sprayed with poisons which as often as not destroy both plant and butterfly.
Whilst there are fewer of the flowers that provide nectar for all the butterflies, it is the effect on larval food plants that can be most critical. Those that rely on nettle, thistle or bramble may sometimes be better off, since these plants move in wherever man disturbs the ground. But the Swallowtail, for instance is suffering badly. Milk parsley, on which its larvae mainly feed, is becoming increasingly rare because the fenland areas on which it grows are being drained for agriculture..”
Why not help to bring back some of those which are in danger by planting your own native plants to attract and help conserve the butterflies.
A few plants that you might consider adding are milk parsley, thistle, bramble to your garden or hedgerow and leaving the hedgerow grow to a height where it will flower.,
If you are interested in helping butterflies write to: Butterfly Conservation, P.O.Box 222, Dedham, Colchester, Essex, CO7 6EY.
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