Creating a Butterfly Garden

Written by S. Ashok Kumar

Monday, 31 August 2009 23:01

Butterfly gardens can be of any size – a window box, a portion of your landscaped yard or even a wild untended area of your landed property.

Steps to be taken:

First learn about the butterfly species available in your area or locality.
In your garden, plant adult nectar plants and caterpillar host plants to attract the butterflies.
Plants that flower at the same time are more attractive to butterflies than a single plant with few flowers.
Generally butterflies prefer pink, purple and yellow flowers. The other colours preferred are orange, red, white and blue. So plants with a wide spectrum of flower colours will attract large number of butterflies.
Avoid or minimize use of insecticides and herbicides. Use bio products.
The flowering plants should be in sunny places. Provide some rocks or stonewalls where butterflies can ‘bask’ in the sun as they need warmth before becoming active.
Provide sheltered areas like shrubbery or brush piles to protect them from wind and rain.
Provide damp, slightly salty area for the butterflies as they are attracted to these areas for purposes of intake of salt. (This is called puddling).

Plants preferred by butterflies:

Flowers which do not attract butterflies:

Plants which can be grown from seeds:

Plants which can be propagated from cuttings:

Plants which can be grown from saplings:

Plants which can be grown from leaf roots:

Big trees which can be grown:

Wild plants which can be grown:

Plants and trees with Telugu names:

Last Updated on Monday, 31 August 2009 23:15