Hummingbird and Butterfly Gardening: Butterfly magnet, 1 by jmorth

jmorth wrote:
tabasco,
I think the local 'fly-lane' is about used up for this year, the magnets are pretty much turning into wispy seed heads...it was truly a fantastic season for butterflies here starting with Red Admirals on Coneflowers and ending with the Monarchs on New England Asters. In between were the Swallowtails (Eastern Tiger), Cabbage Whites, Sulphurs, Hairstreaks, Eastern Tailed Blues, American Snout, Pearl Cresent, Question Marks, Eastern Commas, American Painted Lady, Buckeyes, Viceroys, Silver-spotted Skippers, and golden Skippers. I would be remiss if I failed to mention that in addition to the above many kinds of bees, wasps, and moths (especially the dusk time Hummingbird Moths) also were visiting this year. I must have taken a couple thousand pics.

Pic is one of the moths (attracted by Flowering Tobacco).

Cordeledawg,
There are a lot of native goldenrods up here (at least 9). They are especially plentiful around the edges of woods, and disturbed soil prairies, field borders, rural roads, highways, & exposed river bottoms. Mine must have started from an errant seed probably from a field border. Within the span of a couple of years it has developed into what the pics illustrated. The asters are a couple of years old too. The goldenrod-aster
placement was initially happenstance but couldn't have worked out better had it been planned. This spring I knew the potential so I did selectively destroy or let grow self-seeded seedlings of both species. Theorectically, the show should improve next year. I just hope the asters retain their butterfly magnet status.
I think your plan to plant asters in front of golden rods is great just be sure the varieties utilized meet your needed height standards.

J