Butterfly Garden

Butterflies are attracted towards flowery plants, trees and wetlands. They thrive on sweet nectars from flowers and plants. They are widely seen in open field, meadows and forests. They prefer a warm environment and avoid cold weather and rains. If you want to have a butterfly garden in your backyard, then you need to keep these things in mind.

Why should you build a butterfly garden?

Butterflies are one of the most beautiful species in the world. They are colorful and lively and add beauty to our environment. Sadly, due to human activities such as construction of buildings, using harmful pesticides and building roads on farms have all resulted in destroying the natural habitats of butterflies.

You can save this species by providing a natural habitat for the butterflies in your own backyard. By growing flowering plants which the butterflies like and plants that caterpillar eat, you can multiple the number of butterflies and help in conserving them.

How to create a butterfly garden?

Different species of butterflies like different types of plants from which they suck nectar and get their nutrients. By planting the right kind of plants that the butterflies like to feed on and lay their eggs on, you will ensure that your backyard is full of butterflies in the spring.

You can create a butterfly garden of any size. It could be as small as a shoe box or it could extend to the whole of your backyard and anywhere in between.

Favorite butterfly plants

Butterflies thrive on nectar producing plants. Some of the butterfly shrubs and trees are autumn olive, buttonbush, blueberry, plum, mock orange, redbud, and hibiscus. Butterfly love to suck nectar from flowers like marigold, sunflower, aster, daylilies, coreopsis, butterfly weed, lavender, rosemary and lilac.

However, before creating a butterfly garden you need to do some research. First, you need to know which types of butterfly species are found in your area. Once you know that, then you can make a list of the butterflies you would like to attract, then research on what kind of plants and flowers they thrive on and lay their eggs.

You can contact your local nursery or greenhouse to get these plants. If they do not have them then check online or in catalogs which sell bulbs. Of course you should also know how to plant them.

You can also decorate your butterfly garden with attractive homemade butterfly houses that will shelter the butterflies from adverse weather conditions and also make your garden look beautiful.