Hummingbird and Butterfly Gardening: Silly Parsley Question, 1 by joepyeweed

joepyeweed wrote:
Its not true for every butterfly species but only for certain species. And had I taken notes when I listened to that speaker I could list what butterflies she mentioned had species specific host plants. Monarch was one and certain swallowtails were others. But its not a rule for every butterfly...

It makes sense that if A. incanarta is not natural to your area then the butterflies there would not have normally hosted on it and the successional generations would not prefer it. (Geography, as always, will play a huge role in what plants make good hosts...)

I have several types of milkweed in my yard and I get caterpillars on all of them... but the incanarta in my yard is preferred about 10 to 1 over the tuberosa and about 5 to 1 over the syriaca.

I see tons of sulfurs, lots of eastern swallowtails, monarchs and admirals... I also have tons of bumble bees too.

I have planted some pipevine and I am hoping in a year or two that plant will be large enough to attract some pipevine swallowtails too.