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Butterfly Garden

Planning Your Butterfly Garden

If you are contemplating the construction of a butterfly garden, take a few moments to assess your resources.

  • How much time are you willing (and able) to invest in planting and maintaining your garden?

  • How much money do you want to spend?

  • Is the garden intended to be a formal or informal one? Are you attracting monarchs?

    monarch butterfly
  • Will you have butterfly nectar plants, caterpillar food plants, or both? How are you going to deal with pest problems without pesticides? Are you willing to discourage insect-feeding birds (no nest boxes or berry bushes)?

    The answers to these questions will help you determine the size and scope of your butterfly garden.

    Another step should be to find out which butterflies are in your area. You can do this by spending some time outdoors with a field guide and a pair of binoculars to see which species are around you.

    Plan to spend around 4-5 hours between mid-morning and early afternoon trying to spot butterflies over a three day period. I know it's a lot of time - but it’ll be well worth it!

    Check the Internet as well to find out which butterflies are naturally abundant in your area.

    Butterflies Need Shelter from the Wind


    Most butterflies prefer some shelter from high winds. At the same time, they like open, sunny areas.

    Windbreak plantings or other ways of sheltering the butterfly garden can help provide a great environment for the butterflies.

    Butterflies like to PUDDLE

    Certain kinds of butterflies (mostly males) often can be seen on moist sand or mud collecting around puddles of water where they feed.

    The function of these "mud-puddle clubs" is not really understood, but experts think that the water contains dissolved minerals like salt, which is needed by the insects.

    Maintaining a damp, area in the yard may attract more butterflies. You can do this by leaving a shallow bowl or container filled with wet sand in a sunny spot in the garden.

    butterfly garden with bench



    When planning a garden, create a large section of flowers in the right species to attract and retain butterflies. Consider flowers that bloom in sequence over the season. This is important during summer when flower visiting by butterflies is most frequent.

  • Map your yard out and choose the spot that receives the least amount of wind and the most sunshine. You’ll also want to take into consideration the growing requirements of the plants you'll be putting in,along with their growing needs.

  • Plant your butterfly garden in a sunny location (5-6 hours each day), but sheltered from the winds. Butterflies need the sun to warm themselves, but they won't want to feed in an area where they are constantly fighting the wind to stay on the plants. Afternoon sun will not only bring in lots of butterflies, but will provide great light for viewing and photographing the butterflies.

  • Your garden bed location should be calm and relatively undisturbed – meaning only occasional visits by humans. The more natural the area the greater the number and diversity of butterflies you can attract.

  • Provide cover and shelter, like broad-leaved trees, shrubs, and log piles in your butterfly garden .

  • You also want to have several landing pads or sunbathing perches in open and sunny areas throughout the garden. Butterflies rely to a large degree on thermal heating and sunbathe in these open spots. A variety of large varied stones can be used for for this and for decorative purposes as well.

  • Determine what type of soil you have. Is it sandy, clay, wetland, well-drained, or very dry? This is very important to know when you select the plants.

    It's a good idea to have the soil tested. This will provide you with valuable information about the chemical makeup and condition (texture) of your soil.

    The soil testing lab can provide you with suggestions for improving soil fertility and drainage, if needed. This can also make a difference in what types of plants will be able to thrive in your butterfly garden.

  • What types of trees are in the area? This is important since most moth larvae eat tree leaves; leaves are also the food plant for some of the swallowtails and the mourning cloak. Some trees also produce flowers attractive to adult butterflies. There are specific trees called butterfly trees that can draw hundreds and hundreds of butterflies to it. These include birch trees and red oaks.

  • Butterflies need water just like we do. Keep a mud puddle damp in a sunny location, or fill a bucket with sand and enough water to make the sand moist. Periodically saturate the sand to keep it moist. You can also bury the bucket in the ground for aesthetic purposes and provide access to it by surrounding it with some small rocks.

    Male butterflies appreciate a patch of wet sand or dirt. They sip salts and other minerals from the sand, a behavior known as “puddling”. The minerals are passed on in a sperm packet during mating, to enrich the eggs.

  • In you want to include the use of butterflies in your landscape you will need to create a safety zone for your butterflies to feel safe. Butterflies frequent habitual zones, where they feel safe and where areas of the landscape meet with the tree lines.

    Creating your butterfly gardens near or around trees will help in attracting even more of these graceful creatures to your gardens. You should also consider hedges; groups of small trees or shrubs; or walls, fences, trellises covered with vines.Butterflies are attracted to areas of your gardens where they can gather food for their offspring. The caterpillar will eat from the plants while the adult butterflies will sip on the nectar of the flowers.

    As your plants, shrubs, and flowers mature, the amount of butterflies to your gardens will also increase. The plants and flowers that you put in your garden this year will attract only a few, but in the years to come the natural instinct of the butterfly will lead them to your garden.

    What Do Adult Butterflies Need?

    What is the adult butterfly searching for in your gardens?

    Well, they search for areas to take shelter from the high winds, rains, summer storms. This is where the trees and shrubs in your gardens become important to protect the butterfly and offer shelter.

    During the normal, warm sunny summer day the butterfly wants the wide-open areas of your lawn and garden.

    Butterflies will seek soft soil that is sandy-like to find water. The sand-like soil that allows water to puddle up after a rainstorm is a butterfly’s delight.

    Butterflies don't need anything fancy or expensive: just a large, open, sun-filled area; some flowers with nectar, for adults; some food sources, for caterpillars; shelter; puddles; and rocks. You might consider planting an herb garden if you enjoy herbs - because many butterfly species do too.

    So now you have the location and a plan put in place for your garden.

    The next step is to figure out what plants to use in a butterfly garden.

    Related Articles

    Pictures of Butterflies

    Use Plants that Attract Butterflies and Catepillars for Best Results

    Tips on Photographing Butterflies


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