Attracting Butterflies To Your Garden
 (Read 100+ times)
By Glory Lennon
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A friend once asked me how I got so many butterflies in my yard. At first I just looked around bewildered. Didn’t everyone have as many butterflies in their yard? Obviously not! I had to admit I did nothing to attract them purposely but I must have been doing something right. They were all over the place!
So, what exactly was it that brought butterflies into my yard? The query even stumped me for a bit until I did some observing. Always a good thing to do if you want to get to the bottom of things. Like all God’s creatures, butterflies require the basics of life, that is to say, food, shelter, water and a place to raise a family. Provide all or most of these and you too shall have friends asking how you miraculous brought butterflies to your yard.
Shelter– I noticed butterflies struggling to fly across the windy, wide-open space of my front lawn area but once they reached the sanctuary of the back yard they could rest. Why was my back yard a sanctuary? Because I made it that way for me. It just so happened the butterflies liked it too. I have layers of windbreaks using trees, shrubs and a tall picket fence to diffuse the often sturdy, blustering wind into a gentle breeze. We are all able to relax there.
Food – The butterfly sips nectar from flowers. There are too many flowers to name that appeal to them but here are a few I’ve noticed they particularly like in my garden: Purple Coneflower, Sweet William, Daisy, Rudbeckia, Coreopsis, Sundrops, Rosa Rugosa, Butterfly bush and Zinnias.
Water – While I provide water for the birds with fountains, birdbaths and ponds, these do not appeal to the butterfly. They prefer the mud puddle. They get nutrients from the soil as well. If you find this a bit unseemly for your garden you may take a large clay saucer and fill it with damp soil or sand. Place a few large stones around it and the cold-blooded butterfly can warm up with the heat the stones give off. In the early morning hours you may find butterflies basking in the sun waiting to warm up enough for flight. This is the perfect time to catch a butterfly, by the way.
Family – The butterfly very conveniently will lay its eggs on the plants the emerging caterpillars will eat. Some favorites are Parsley, Milkweed, Asclepia (Butterfly weed), Yarrow and Hollyhock. Different butterflies have their own preferences so check with the local Botanical garden for your particular area. If you find holes in leaves most likely it’s a caterpillar feeding on it. They usually don’t do much damage and if you look every carefully you might find these same plants serve as a place for the caterpillar to hide in the chrysalis before it becomes the butterfly. No, not a cocoon. Moths use the cocoon.
Now you are all set to attract butterflies to your garden. Flowers that are pleasing to you will invariably be pleasing to butterflies. If you plant them they will come. Works out well, huh?
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Author Bio Box: Glory Lennon
 For more garden talk, funny short stories and romantic novel excerpts visit http://www.helium.com/users/32782
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