Brightly colored butterflies can be a welcome addition to your garden, not only because of how pretty they look, but also because of their usefulness in pollinating flowers. Here are the Best Plants for a Butterfly Garden:
Provide the butterflies with warmth (a sunny spot), shelter (shrubs and trees) and nectar and butterflies will start to use your garden to feed and maybe even breed.
Here are 10 good Butterfly Garden plants to have to attract butterflies:
#1. Aubretia
Aubrieta ‘Doctor Mules’; a carpet-forming plant that produces rich violet or blue flowers in May and June.
#2. Sweet rocket
Hesperis matronalis; deliciously scented plant that produces white, violet or purple flowers from May to August.
#3. Red valerian
Centranthus ruber; a cottage garden plant that produces clusters of red flowers from mid-summer through to autumn. Great for dry soil.
#4. Lavender
Lavandula; a familiar garden favourite, producing white, pink, blue or purple aromatic flowers during the summer months. Flowers and foliage are used for making pot-pourri.
#5. Honesty
Lunaria annua; a tall plant with heart-shaped leaves and sweet-smelling pink or violet-purple flowers from April to June.
#6. Teasel
Dipsacus fullonum; a plant that produces spiny flower-heads of pinkish purple from mid- to late summer.
#7. Small Scabious
Scabiosa ‘Butterfly Blue’; a long-flowering plant that produces lavender-blue flowers from late spring well into autumn.
#8. Butterfly bush
Buddleja davidii; this plant produces cone-shaped clusters of tiny flowers in either purple, white, pink, or red. Irresistible to butterflies!
#9. Golden rod
Solidago ‘Goldenmosa’; a clump-forming border plant that produces feathery, golden flower-heads in late summer and early autumn.
#10. Ivy
Hedera helix; an evergreen climbing vine that will provide winter nectar for the few remaining butterflies in your garden.
More information on Butterflies available from the Butterfly Website
Over to you now. Do you get butterflies visiting your garden? Have you planted certain plants to attract butterflies? Tell us about it in the comments below.
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