Our county’s Master Gardeners group maintains the gardens at one of the parks in town. As part of the park, they have an area that is designated as a butterfly garden. We started taking our kids to this park early last summer when the ‘hunting painted rocks’ craze was raging. This park was a hotspot for painted rock activity! In any case, my kids (and I) fell in love with the butterfly garden. I started to think about if it would be possible to start one at home.
Around the same time as all of the rock hunting activity, we were gifted a new-to-us swing set. We already had a swing set, but ours had not fared very well on the move from our old house to the new one. It seemed wasteful to just chunk it to the curb, so my wheels started turning on a way to repurpose the set. Our yard has very little area that can be considered full sun (which is most of the time awesome, not so much when starting a garden!) I thought we might be able to turn the swing set into a hub for our butterfly garden, and had a vision of vines growing over the top of the slide and up the wooden uprights.
Getting Started
Round 1
We pushed the old swing set into the sun and against the fence. I enlisted my husband’s help to get the ground torn up around it and install a border. We ran chicken wire up the slide (for a vine to be determined later!) and replaced the swings with hooks for hanging baskets.
I started this endeavor very late in the summer last year, and my first go ’round was an epic fail. I chose a few plants I liked and a vine that I knew butterflies liked (a passion vine!) My hanging baskets burned up in the hot July sun, and my passion vine was planted way too late to gain any traction. It was not what I hoped it’d be. I shared a picture of what it looked like after last year’s failure here.
I decided this year we’d start early, do our research, and attract those butterflies!
Round 2
My oldest son and I Googled information regarding butterfly gardening in Texas. If you live in another region of the country, a quick Google search should provide a list of plants that will do well in your area! I’ll share what has started working for us. I’ve included a link at the end of this post to a helpful resource that I started with!
Here’s how our butterfly garden is looking right now. We are just getting into the hotter days of the year, and several of these plants should be taking off soon! I’ll update when they get larger, but wanted to go ahead and share so you can go ahead and get after it too.
I’ll break it down left to right so you can see what we’ve got going on!
The Plants (and Visitors!) in Our Butterfly Garden
On the Slide:
My mom and dad have a passion vine that reseeds every year. This year, they’ve had several sprout up around their yard and offered to allow us to attempt to transplant some for our butterfly garden. I hadn’t decided what vine I was going to put on the slide, but since these were going to be weedwhacked anyway I thought, “Why not?”
The passion vine is a host plant for the Gulf Fritillary, meaning it is what the caterpillars feed on. I’ll be real honest. Until researching butterfly gardens I hadn’t given much thought into whether or not caterpillars were finicky eaters. Turns out, some are.
The little guy in the pictures above either hitched a ride on one of the transplants or was laid very shortly after planting here. The pictures of him are only a few days apart. They grow fast! I’m hoping my plants can keep up with him. He’s already stripped one and has moved on to another. The plants had a bit of a shock when I moved them, but two have started putting on new growth! Hopefully he’ll move on to the next phase of his life soon, and my vines will have a chance to recover before the next one shows up.
The Ladder:
At my last house, I had a wonderful blackberry vine. As I mentioned earlier, we have very little sun in this yard – which is a bummer if you want blackberries! I decided to give the blackberry vine a shot on the ladder, knowing that it may ultimately be overrun by caterpillars. I’m not using any chemical pest control in this area (because caterpillars = butterflies!) so if it goes, it goes. But I will say, so far the caterpillars have stuck to their preferred host plants.
To the left of the ladder I’ve planted an Autumn Sage (Salvia greggii). I hear they don’t love clay soil, but my nurserywoman convinced me to give it a shot. So far, so good. There’s one species of caterpillar hanging out around the buds of this one, and my research suggests it’s that of a southern pink moth. I’ll see how much damage these guys do to my flowers before I decide how badly I want to see a southern pink moth. (There’s seriously like 10 of these little suckers at least! And it’s very strange – they eat at the bloom instead of the leaves! If you have tiny black spots, aka caterpillar poo, on the leaves of your salvia, check the blooms for these guys.)
Just to the right of the slide, I’ve planted a milkweed I found at the master gardeners’ plant sale. I know you need quite a few to attract monarchs. But my plan is just to start slow and see if it will reseed next year before I buy a bunch of them! Also, I had no idea how large those guys got!
My husband put his cacti on top of the platform so that they will be a) getting great sun and b) inaccessible to our boys/dogs. We actually have had them bloom in the past, so if they do, they’ll be another nectar source.
The Middle Ground
In the middle of the swing set we’ve got hooks for hanging baskets. I’ll take a look around now that it’s getting warmer for a few more nectar plants to put up there.
In the main area of the bed just to the right of the platform, we were able to score a perennial lantana from my husband’s mom. I’m excited to see if it’ll do well here – hers usually get pretty large by the end of the summer and is covered in butterflies!
In the front of the open area, the large bushy thing you see is a bronze leaf fennel. This was purchased as a small starter plant, and again, I had no idea how large this would be! It sends up new fronds nearly every day. But this fennel is where a lot of butterfly action happens.
The Fennel
So far on the fennel, we’ve seen a green caterpillar with white stripes (I’m pretty sure it’s just a moth!) and an abundance of black swallowtail action. I am fascinated by these butterflies, and I was even able to see – and photograph – this little lady lay her eggs here! (Which have since hatched. I brought one frond with an egg inside so the boys and I could be on baby watch!)
The Dill
Also in the center area of the garden are several dill and parsley plants. We sowed seed for these early in the spring, and have quite a few moderately sized plants. Our very first visitor (a black swallowtail caterpillar) was on one of these dill sprouts. I actually went out one morning to relocate one of the small dill plants – and couldn’t find it! It had been stripped clean. I was able to find the culprit on a nearby dill, where he stayed until he was very, very fat. He went missing while my family was on a camping trip, and I’ve been telling myself he went off to pupate and NOT to be fed to a cardinal baby.
We’ve since had another black swallowtail caterpillar hang out in our parsley, and several of my butterfly friend’s eggs have hatched.
I think these guys are so fun. Did you know that if you poke a black swallowtail caterpillar they shoot out tiny orange horns and emit an offensive smell? Me neither! But now we do.
The Other Herbs
Like the blackberry, there were a few herbs I’d been wanting to have around. I decided to go ahead and take a chance and put them in with the butterfly garden. If the caterpillars end up liking them, next season I’ll find a new spot.
I planted a lemon thyme in the front of the open area so that I can run my hands through it and smell its delicious lemon scent. One of these days I’ll see if there’s a dish I can cook with it, but I honestly just wanted it to be able to smell it! In the galvanized tub on the right of the open area I put a chocolate mint plant. Also for the smelling, but for the mojitos and cooking too! So far, the caterpillars have steered clear of both of these plants.
Coming Soon
I’ve sown some purple coneflower seeds throughout this area, so I’m hoping to see those guys coming up very soon! They (along with the lantana) will be great nectar plants for the butterflies we hope to attract. We will also be finding ‘the perfect sitting rock’ for butterflies to bask on. The butterflies will also need a shallow muddy area, as that is where they will sit to drink water.
On the Right
You can see in this photo a better shot of the mint in the tub. It is true what they say – it spreads fast, so unless you want a bed of it, contain it! You can also see some of our random dill plants from seed sprinkled in there.
In front of the post, I planted a blue mistflower. This one should grow considerably and be a wonderful nectar source as well. Most of the nectars I’ve got planned like the heat, so they should be showing off soon.
Right beside the galvanized tub we’ve planted Turk’s cap. This one will also be much larger and a nectar source once it reaches maturity. In the meantime while there’s still empty space around it, I placed another of the milkweed I got from the local plant sale in this area. Along with some dill, of course. So much dill.
The Rewards
So far, this year has already been a success in my book. We’ve attracted several species of caterpillars, so I’m certain once our nectars get going we will be seeing butterflies regularly. My kids and I so far have observed butterfly eggs along with super tiny baby caterpillars and have watched them through many stages of their caterpillar lives. We have yet to see one form (and come out of) a chrysalis, but I think the odds are in our favor.
My 6 year old son checks on “our friends” every day, and my 3 year old is particularly interested in ‘the spiky guy.’ This has been a great little biology experiment for us, and not to mention a visually pleasing addition to our back yard.
Click the image below to print a free butterfly garden planner!
If you’re looking for more summer fun, check out these posts:
Kids’ Summer Reading Challenge
Let me know if you have any questions about starting your own garden! If you do decide to start one of your own, I’d love to see a photo! Check out the resources below for more information and helpful plant lists!
Texas Parks and Wildlife: “So You Want to Start a Butterfly Garden”