A garden is the most fun in summer because everything is in bloom at this time of year. In addition to flowers, butterflies also contribute to the richness of color. Unfortunately, insects have had a hard time finding enough food in recent years. However, people and animals benefit from fragrant, flowering plants.
Which plants are ideal for butterflies?
Plants such as anise hyssop, buddleia, orange milkweed, verbena, waterweed and bronze fennel are suitable for attracting butterflies to the garden. Avoid cultivated shrubs with double flowers as they contain little nectar pollen.
Useful plants for butterflies
Anise Hyssop
- Flowering time: late summer
- Location: heat and drought tolerant
With its beautiful purple flowers, the anise hyssop is also ideal as a cut flower. Do you often have small game visiting your garden? Don't worry, rabbits and deer won't eat the flowers.
buddleia
- Flowering time: all summer long
- Flower color: blue, purple or white
The buddleia is rightly called the butterfly bush. Its intense smell promises the hard-working folds a high nectar yield. Anyone who loves butterflies cannot avoid this shrub. Hardly any other plant attracts so many insects to the garden.
Orange Milkweed
- Flowering period: June to September
- Flower color: orange
The orange silk flower is popular with butterflies of all stages of development. While the adult butterflies suck the nectar from the flowers, the caterpillars feast on the leaves. Above all, the monarch butterfly feels magically attracted to the plant.
Vervain
- Flowering period: May to October
- Flower color: purple
Butterflies and gardeners alike enjoy the small, delicate flowers of verbena. Butterflies visit the plant primarily as a source of nectar. The gardener uses the plant as a decorative element in bouquets because it is wonderful as a cut flower. You don't have to worry about robbing the butterflies of an important food source by cutting the flowers. Pruning promotes sprouting, so that people and animals benefit.
Water Dost
- Flowering period: July to September
- Flower color: light pink
With a proud growth height of up to six meters, the water dost takes up a lot of space in the garden and is therefore suitable for filling gaps in the hedge. Is this size beyond your garden? However, you don't have to miss out on visiting butterflies. You can also find the Wasserdost in stores as a small specimen.
Bronze fennel
- Flowering period: June to August
- Flower color: yellow
The bronze fennel impresses more with its delicate foliage than with its colorful flowers. Nevertheless, butterflies like to seek out the impressive plant - especially the swallowtail.
General note: To attract lots of butterflies to the garden, you should avoid cultivated shrubs. These usually have so-called double flowers, which look beautiful but hardly contain any nectar pollen.
