Hummingbird and Butterfly Gardening: PART 2 BF Host Plant Seed Trade DISCUSSION, 0 by debnes_dfw_tx

debnes_dfw_tx wrote:
T made an excellent point that some new BF gardeners

Quoting: I could have gotten along with just that verbena bonarienses and some milkweed, I think.

.
To begin butterfly gardening all it takes is one host plant in significant supply, in an area easily watched after.. and one really great nectar plant that blooms continually.. Most people who have been gardening any length of time have a lot of flowers already. Adding just one host changes the whole atmosphere of any garden.

Starting out it helped me a lot to plant the host right outside the front door in a small section surrounded by Pink Hawthorn shrubs. I planted several culinary herbs and before I knew it I had Black Swallotails laying eggs and hatching hungry lil caterpillars (it was the Parsly). All I had to do was look after the plants and keep them from dying in the droutful heat.

You might even say I bonded with them better not having so many of their cousins just as well as if I had 10 kinds of caterpillars duckin and diving through my garden paths. It is impossible to be this close to the lives of even a small quantity of these wee creatures without gaining a depth of peace and wisdom..Somehow being exposed enhances our resilliance to these stressful times today. Better than drugs for sure!!!!

You will always find a consistant level of ongoing support in this here in the DG Community Threads for Butterflies and Hummers. Your experience is the thing I personally want to hear about, and have a ringside seat to all your cool pictures. (I have over 100,000 pics myself, lol of animant and inanamant lifeforms, haha). Nothing like witnessing something so amazing and having people who are eager to hear about it from you. Keep showing us what is happening in your garden, just because it is getting winter in the Norhern Hemisphere doesn't mean everything stops. Winter wildlife can be just as interresting, if not exciting.

Anything we may miss easily in the thread? just Dmail me or Tobasco!

I will be here just as much, but now I will also begin a new "Nectar Plants for Butterflies and Hummers Seed Exchange Discussion". Keep both of these on your Watch Threads list.

To all those who already, or are about to Host Butterflies.....We salute you!!
o/
Deb Magnes

Pic from my small host garden:
Snapdragons, Host for Buckeye ( free jpg of Buckeye > http://www.theletteroflove.com/wallpaper/wp-content/photos/b... )