THE BUTTERFLY GARDEN

 
A Polydamas Swallowtail (Battus polydamas) sips nectar from a Mexican sunflower (Tithonia rotundifolia ‘Torch’). 
 Visit the Memphis Zoo during the summer months, and you’re sure to see butterflies visiting the blooming plants on zoo grounds.  The best place to see these beauties is the Butterfly Garden, planted around the perimeter of the new “Birds & Bees” exhibit (the location of 2007 – 2008’s “Butterflies: In Living Color”). This area is heavily planted with colorful flowers, and draws in beautiful butterflies from May through October (August and September are usually the best months to see the largest number of butterflies).

Hummingbirds are frequent visitors, too. (Come first thing in the morning for your best chance to see them! In the afternoon, watch for hummingbirds catching tiny insects in mid-flight over the water in “World of Waterfowl”.)

Butterfly gardens are rewarding and easy to grow.
Enjoy ours during your zoo visit, and take home some ideas for starting one of your own. Whether you have a huge yard to work with, or just an apartment balcony, provide the right plants and the butterflies will come to you.

Brilliant Blooms: More than Just a Pretty Face

A butterfly garden should be full of colorful flowers, and ours is no exception. The glowing orange, 4” blooms of the Mexican Sunflowers (Tithonia) and the abundant multi-colored flowers of the lantana (Lantana camara) are sure to bring a smile to your face. These colorful blooms serve a very practical purpose: they provide food for butterflies. The flowers that butterflies visit are called nectar plants. You can watch as the adult butterflies sip nectar out of each blossom that they visit. While some adult butterflies supplement their meals with such delicacies as rotting fruit and animal dung, flower nectar is the most important part of most butterflies’ diet.

Many of the best nectar plants for butterflies are native to this part of the United States. Purple coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea), black-eyed susans (Rudbeckia species), and Joe Pye Weed (Eupatorium species) are all beautiful natives that butterflies love. 		 
Black swallowtails (Papilio polyxenes) and other butterflies are attracted to native plants, like this black-eyed susan (Rudbeckia hirta).

Many popular non-native garden plants, such as lantana (Lantana camara) and butterfly bush (Buddleia) also offer irresistible nectar.
 
A Monarch (Danaus plexippus) drinks from scarlet milkweed (Asclepias curassavica). Milkweed is a must for any butterfly garden: it’s a nectar plant for the adults, and also a host plant for monarch caterpillars.

If We Had To Choose


Our horticulture staff is often asked to name the very best nectar plants to include in a butterfly garden. We’ve let the butterflies decide. Based on our observations, these are the 12 plants in our exhibit that seem to get the most butterfly attention:
Agastache
  
Anise Hyssop
Ageratum
Milkweed
Buddleja
Butterfly Bush
Echinacea
Purple Coneflower
Lantana
Lantana                      
Melampodium
Melampodium
Pentas
Pentas ‘Ruby Glow’
Rudbeckia
Black-eyed Susan      
Tithonia
Mexican Sunflower
Verbena
Verbena
Vitex
Chaste Tree
Zinnia
Zinnia
Click here for a complete list of the plants used in our butterfly garden.

But don’t stop there! A butterfly garden just isn’t complete without host plants…

The Perfect Host

Surprisingly, the most important plants to include in a butterfly garden are not the brightly colored flowers, but the host plants: the plants that butterfly caterpillars need to eat. Caterpillars can’t eat just anything. Each species can only feed on certain plants, and in many cases, only one or two very specific host plants will do. Once host plants are in your yard, female butterflies will find them by their scent, and male butterflies will follow the females. The caterpillars feed on the host plants, and then become butterflies themselves, ready to float about your yard. By planting host plants, you help create more butterflies!

There are several host plants in our butterfly garden. Passionvines (Passiflora), with their beautiful, exotic-looking flowers, are the only host plant used by gulf fritillaries. Milkweeds (Asclepias) are the only food source for Monarch caterpillars.  Sweetbay magnolia (Magnolia virginiana), a small tree that produces sweetly fragrant blooms in early summer, is one of several host plants used by the tiger swallowtail. Spicebush (Lindera benzoin) is the preferred host for spicebush swallowtails. Parsley, fennel, and dill are all eagerly eaten by black swallowtail cats.
                                                                          

 
 
The stunning blooms of passionvines (this one is Passiflora caerulea ‘Waterloo Blue’) are enough of a reason to grow them in a garden! But they are also a host plant for gulf fritillaries. The orange and black caterpillars munch on the leaves, and then turn into beautiful butterflies.
 

   From left:
a black swallowtail cat eats parsley; a gulf fritillary cat nibbles on passionvine; and a pipevine swallowtail  cat munches on pipevine.

The Butterfly Life Cycle

In a butterfly garden that contains both host plants and nectar plants, you can see butterflies in each fascinating stage of their development. After mating with a male, a female butterfly seeks out a host plant. She carefully lays her eggs on the plant, usually choosing the tip of the leaves, where her newly hatched babies can eat the most tender new growth. After a few days, the eggs hatch, and the tiny caterpillars begin to eat. Many young caterpillars (or larvae) look like pieces of dirt, or like bird droppings, which helps camouflage them from predators. As the larvae eat and grow, they shed their skin several times, and often change colors significantly.

After a caterpillar has grown and shed its skin for the last time, it is ready to pupate, its next stage in life. The caterpillar will crawl far away from its host plant, find a suitable twig or leaf, and there form a chrysalis. For the next 14 days or more, the chrysalis (or pupa) provides protection from sun, wind, and rain, and the caterpillar
 
The spicebush swallowtail (Papilio troilus) life cycle: egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, and adult.
inside goes through an incredible transformation. At the end of this time, the chrysalis darkens and becomes translucent. Then the brand new butterfly breaks through. The butterfly will cling to the outside of the chrysalis, or to a nearby branch, for about 30 minutes while it slowly moves its still-wet wings, waiting for them to spread and dry. Once it is ready, it takes flight for the first time, and begins its search for nectar plants, and a mate! Then the butterfly life cycle begins anew.

  Far left: Native purple coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea) are excellent plants for a butterfly garden.

Left: A buckeye (Junonia coenia) visits a pair of zinnias, an old-time garden favorite, and a great nectar source.



  
Zebra swallowtail caterpillars can only eat the leaves of the pawpaw tree.

You Can Help Wild Butterflies

As more of the natural areas in America are developed, more of the native host plants that butterflies depend on disappear. Landscaping in new housing developments and office parks usually consists of species introduced from other countries. Butterflies that are becoming rarely seen in densely populated areas can still be found in rural spots, where their host plants are still plentiful. You can help reverse this trend by including native host plants in your landscape. Try planting a pawpaw (Asimina triloba). This native tree is the only host plant for the Zebra Swallowtail, Tennessee’s state butterfly. This striking black and white beauty can often be seen in the zoo and in Overton Park, where pawpaw trees grow naturally throughout the forest. Outside of the park, however, this butterfly is now rarely seen inside the city. Plant a pawpaw and see if you can lure some to your neighborhood! (The large, edible fruits that mature pawpaws produce in summer are yet another reason to grow them.)
 
Another great choice is the spicebush (Lindera benzoin), a large shrub (or small tree) that grows naturally as an understory tree in wild spots in the Memphis area. It is one of the host plants for the Spicebush Swallowtail, which sports black and iridescent blue wings, and which is certainly one of our most beautiful North American butterflies. The caterpillars are quite unique, as well – they sport huge eyespots on their backs to ward off potential predators. Add a spicebush or two to your yard, and see what turns up! Ask for these and other native host plants at your local nursery, or look for them at the zoo’s annual spring plant sale.

Try not to use pesticides in your garden – besides killing off “pests,” the poisons will kill your butterflies, too. Protect your butterflies, birds, and other wildlife (including children!) by keeping your garden natural and safe.
     
Right: A monarch (Danaus plexippus)  sips nectar from the blooms of anise hyssop (Agastache ‘Blue Fortune’), a selection of a native North American wildflower.

Far right: A question mark butterfly (Polygonia interrogationis) visits Melampodium flowers.


  
  



Far left: Gulf fritillaries (Agraulis vanillae) match the brilliant orange of Mexican sunflower (Tithonia) blooms.
                                                                                    
Left: Wildflowers and garden hybrids mingle happily together in the Memphis Zoo’s butterfly garden.



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