What Butterflies Want

Joe Pye Weed 'Little Joe' (eupatorium dubium)

Fluttering and floating—the garden is full of life with butterflies. It's a delightful experience to walk through a garden and be brushed on the cheek by soft wings. Although I'm using swallowtails for my photos, there are many more varieties in the garden.

For a butterfly garden, success is guaranteed if you include agastache, cosmos, joe pye weed, milkweed, butterfly bushes, lantana, salvia and zinnias. There are many other nectar and host plants for butterflies, but these are the favorites in my garden.

Agastache 'Blue Fortune' is a favorite, attracting
many butterflies as well as Gold Finches and bees.

Agastache 'Cotton Candy' is proving
to be as popular as 'Blue Fortune' with me and
the butterflies!

Agastache 'Heat Wave', with tubular blooms
is also loved by hummingbirds.

Bog sage (salvia uliginosa) is great for
moist areas in the garden, but can handle drought.
Another hummingbird favorite, too.

Butterfly bush 'Honeycomb' (buddleia)
is one of twenty in my garden. 'Adonis Blue', 'Pink Delight'
and 'Royal Red' buddleia are also wonderful.

Comos sulphureus, an annual grown from seeds.
I also grow cosmos bipinnatus in pink, white and deep rose.

Lantana, an unknown pink-yellow variety that is
a perennial in my zone 7b garden. I also grow the orange-gold 'Miss Huff'.

Benary's Giant Zinnia in salmon. Easy to grow from seed.
I have many different colors of zinnias and the
salmon looks great with lime green blooms.

My bronze butterfly marks a patch of pink swamp milkweed,
joe pye weed and ironweed.
Milkweed is the host plant for Monarch butterflies.

Words and photos by Freda Cameron, Defining Your Home, Garden and Travel. Deer and rabbit resistance varies based upon the animal population and availability of food. All company or product or patented names mentioned are registered trademarks, copyrights, or patents owned by those respective companies or persons.