www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

If anybody is looking at plants that attract Butterflies for the garden you could do a lot worse than planting some Verbena Bonariensis, dead easy to grow, seeds readily so you can give some away and is Brilliant at attracting late summer Butterflies, this week the numbers of Painted Lady`s have been growing to a total 14 today, 2 Comma`s, 4 or 5 Red Admirals, loads of White`s and the odd Small Copper, i am sure these have all been attracted by the Verbena, this has been a huge improvement on what has been a dissapointing summer for me in the Garden.

What a lovely photo, I could see three Painted Ladies, was the photo taken recently, nice garden you have there. Shirley

Shirley Roulston wrote:What a lovely photo, I could see three Painted Ladies, was the photo taken recently, nice garden you have there. Shirley

Thanks Shirley, The pic was taken on Weds 10th Sept, The Painted Ladies have now dissapeared, it may have something to do with the endless rain here in Essex, the weekend looks better though. Steve

I have seen that plant before, where I saw it, there was painted ladys, Red Admirals, Small Tortoiseshells and a few whites on them. Nice to know you foind all those different species on them roundwood, and I always wondered what the name was, now I know.

I've got stacks of the stuff and all I get on it is whites.

It was a lovely afternoon in North Essex this afternoon so i thought i would stand in the middle of my Verbena flower bed and take a few pics of the many butterfly visitors, 10 minutes of pure pleasure.

If you want to increase the amount of vebena in your garden this is a good time of year to layer it. Just take a stem and pin it down to the ground, by next spring it should have rooted at various points along its length. You can then divide the stem up and re-plant each new section. Easy.

Thanks Susie, I'll do that this afternoon, never heard of that. Can't wait for the spring. Shirley

You might like to read here about the proper way to do layering, Shirley, although I find that my cheats version works just as well. I do it for lots of plants. It is particularly good with herbs like lavender. I find that roots usually appear in a few months, tops, but over winter it will take a bit longer.

http://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profiles0602/layering.asp

over the past few weeks there have been an increasing number of goldfinches feeding on the heads of vebena bonariensis in the garden. The sight of them and a few siskins really brightened up the garden today which is looking very dull and bedraggled now the snow and frost has gone.

Susie wrote:I've got stacks of the stuff and all I get on it is whites.

Whats so boring about whites i know there common but if you get to know them a bit better like me you will find there beautiful.

roundwood123 wrote:It was a lovely afternoon in North Essex this afternoon so i thought i would stand in the middle of my Verbena flower bed and take a few pics of the many butterfly visitors, 10 minutes of pure pleasure.

I love your pictures Ive got verbena but i would like some more.

There is nothing wrong with whites at all, I just would have liked to have had some different butterflies too and in 2009 I certainly did. What a year to look back on, there seemed to be a steady stream of butterflies on the vebena bonariensis while it was in flower, which was right up until a few weeks back.