I do have lots of butterfly and hummingbird attracting plants here already (like 5 butterfly bushes) but today I ordered some Tropical Milkweed (which I get most years) and some orange Butterfly Weed to attrack the butterflies.
Then afew days ago I had ordered more Hummingbird Mint from High Country Gardens for the Hummers around here. Also called Agastache, I must say they are great plants and HCG is known for their own intros. They start blooming early summer and just keep right on going until a hard freeze. Agastache is one of my favorite plants even though it is slightly fussy and you have to find the right place for it, one with excellent drainage.
I had bought many Hummingbird Mints last spring and since they all came thru the winter excellently, I knew I just had to add more.
Links-
High Country Gardens
http://www.highcountrygardens.com/
Rose Franklin Perennials
http://www.butterflybushes.com/index.htm
Adding New Plants for the Butterflies and Hummingbirds
You know, I thought I had bought some lovely pink salvia. But after some research, I think it was agastache. Any other advice besides good drainage?
Keep the mulch off the crowns in the winter.
I ordered some Hello Yellow milkweed today. I have read good things about the long bloom time. I hope it does well.
Love the agastache. Myine stayed green at the base even during the winnter. It' starting grow now. Mine are in a regular drainage area (not wet, not dry) and in full sun. They do quite well all summer long.
Of all the plants, native or not, the far-and-away favorite here (Florida panhandle) is tickseed, the weedy, unattractive white-flowered kind that takes over everything. Next is plain old zinnia, followed closely by lantana. The black swallowtail cats love fennel and dill, and the Gulf fritillaries hardly let the maypops (native passion flower) out of the ground. I keep a bitter orange tree just for the giant swallowtails, but they like other things, too, and the spicebush swallowtails eat sassafras. One mystery: zebra swallowtails are supposed to feed exclusively on pawpaw, but I have the swallowtails and can't find the pawpaws.
This message was edited Apr 8, 2010 11:34 PM
I grow zinnias here too. I just love them. When I first started growing them, I noticed that the butterflies, especially the Monarches love them. That surprised me as I didn't think that butterflies loved zinnias. But it has to be the old fashioned types of zinnias and the more single rather than fuller the flower, the better for the butterflies. Not those profusion zinnias though. I have never seen a butterfly interested in them, ever.
No hummers here yet, but I'm cleaning out the garden and rescuing from the mulch old HB garden stalwarts too. (And I have some seeds sprouting.)
If you have a hankering to spend money, dogwooderitternet an ebay seller located in Jasper Arkansas, has a big selection of great hard to find hummingbird and butterfly plants at very very reasonable prices. I think you can find him on e-bay by googling "dogwooderitternet" (or "lonicera major wheeler honeysuckle" which he sells.) He has an excellent reputation among butterfly and hummingbird gardeners and I have bought from him several times.
We put out our feeders today and took out our overwintering salvias and honeysuckles and put them in the sunshine. I have a feeling in a week or so our hummers will be back since they seem to arrive at our house when the lilacs and buckeyes bloom, which should be very soon. In the past the earliest we've had them has been April 8.
I also hang out a red garden flag and other red knick knacks in the hope that a HB 'fly by' will be attracted to our yard by the red color. And a big basket of red geraniums in an obvious place, too.
I can only hope! Good luck on the hummer watching! t.
I never buy anything at e-bay.
TDream, I just wanted to say that the Zebra Swallowtail use pawpaw. Another kind, the Zebra Longwing use Maypop and some other passifloras. I've never seen a Zebra Swallowtail, but the other ones show up here occasionally.
http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/species?l=1353
http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/species?l=1670
This message was edited Apr 8, 2010 9:28 PM
All, I bought some maypop (and transplanted some from the roadside that I saw AFTER I purchased 2) last year and the gulf frits ate them almost to the ground. They haven't popped up yet. When do they usually show up (I'm in 7b)? I thought these were practically impossible to kill.
I also purchased a pipevine tomentosa. Has anyone had luck with pipevined swallowtails on this vine?
My Maypops are back now, but it should be warmer here than where you are. I haven't had A. tomentosa yet, so can't help you on that one. I hear it's good, however.
ladybug:
Maypop (Passiflora incarnata) is always the last of the passionvines to pop up in my yard, so yours are most likely just fine. Aristolochia tomenentosa is a great host plant for Pipevine Swallowtails.
Dale Clark
Dallas County Lepidopterists' Society
www.dallasbutterflies.com
To LindTX8. I meant to say zebra swallowtail instead of longwing (I went back and changed it). Probably because I've had longwings already, very early. I had a zebra swallowtail back in March, just out of the chrysalis, absolutely perfect. This has been tiger swallowtail week, regular and the female black morphs; black swallowtails, giants (which aren't that big early on), several littles too fast to get a good look at, and a couple of sulphurs. The tigers like my deep pink "President Clay" azalea, quite a sight. The hummers do, too.
To tabasco: I had on a dark pink sweatshirt today, and a hummer almost sat on my shoulder!
My Maypops are just coming up. It seems like the first one came up about a week ago.
Dale, BTW, the Dallas Butterfly Society has a great website! Lots of good info there! t.
Thanks for the maypop info., everyone!
Greetings all. I will be building a new butterfly & hummingbird bed soon (Sunday, hopefully.) I bought 2 butterfly bush, 1 Turk's Cap, 1 Firecracker Plant, and 2 butterfly weed plants. However, I also bought a bunch of composted cow manure...I am stuck in "veggie" planting mode, you see. I'd hate for it all to go to waste (and it won't), but can I use some of this for my non-veggie bed?
Unless a plant requires "poor dry soil", it should like compost. Go ahead and use it on your flowers, especially annuals. Annual flowers can get the ground "tired out" the same as annual veggies.
John:
I'm currently top dressing all of my flower beds with a couple of inches of compost (I've got 20 cubic yards of it and I'm getting tired of moving it all, let me tell you). It's a great natural fertilizer for perennials as well as annuals. Here's a few old photos of my butterfly farm: http://www.flickr.com/photos/14111783@N06/2068394687/in/photostream/
And thanks tabasco for the kind words about the DCLS website. I have lots more stuff to add -- just can't find the time.
Dale Clark
Dallas County Lepidopterists' Society
www.dallasbutterflies.com
Ok pollen, thanks for the advice!!
Dale- that was an excellent slide show. Nice butterfly farm!
My Agastache and Salvia came yesterday from High Country Gardens. I just opened the box and left them in there overnight as I didn't have time to do more than that. Today I planted them all. Its going to look extra nice here come summertime. I am sure the hummers will enjoy the extra hummingbird mints also.