www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

I joined this happy band mainly for photographic help, which has been brilliant but would like some advice for a butterfly friendly garden.

I have a large garden, but apart from cutting the grass, or should I say moss, and doing some weeding, I know precious little about gardening. I am going to plant two buddlias but should they be particular types and would like to create a cottage garden type bed with hollyhocks ( I think) etc to get some flowers in. I do get butterflys in my garden, they pass through on their way to someone else's and by the time I've grabbed the camera, they've gone !
As the weather is warming up a bit for February I can do a bit of planning for the spring.

Any sugstions would be welcome.

Tom

Buddleias are always a good idea so you are off to a good start there.

Some easy to care for plants that will fit in with your cottage garden theme are:-

cuckoo flower
garlic mustard
honesty
sweet rocket
forgetmenot
buddleia
scabious
valerian
vebena bonariensis
knapweed

Thanks Susie, I will do a bit of reading on these. I presume I can grow from seed and so will be planting in the spring.

Thanks again

Tom

Hi Tom,

Don't forget Aubretia, (cheap enough to buy plants) and it spreads.
Early in the season when there is not much in flower, butterflies flock to it.
Last year in April I had Red Admiral, Peacock and Orange-tip on mine.

Denise

Hi Denise,

Thanks for the suggestion.

On another subject, I've had a look at your website and am very impressed. Did you set it up yourself or did someone do it for you. This should probably be in the photography forum Ha, Ha !

Tom

Hi Tom,

When it comes to anything technical I am a total dunce!
My son-in-law is having a go for me. We're not quite there yet but at least we're on our way.
I feel that I need to make the thumbnails bigger and perhaps frame them.
It is very much still a work in progress, but I'm glad that you liked it.

Denise

Hi Tom,

One plant that often gets missed when talking of butterfly-friendly gardens is dandelion, which is great for the early spring hibernators.

If you are interested in photographing the caterpillars, buckthorn (for brimstone) and garlic mustard (for orange-tip) are good ideas - buckthorn as part of a hedge and garlic mustard at the base of a hedge. Other good low-growing hedgerow plants for butterflies are bugle and herb-robert, which the orange-tips will use for nectar, and lady's bedstraw, which is the foodplant for the hummingbird hawk-moth. At the back of the border or in the hedge, hemp-agrimony attracts brimstones, peacocks etc in July.

If you have a meadow or similar nearby with Meadow Brown, Gatekeeper etc, marjoram and mints will attract them in. The golden skippers like viper's bugloss, which is also extremely attractive to bumblebees.

If you have a rockery then a lot of the blues' foodplants will go well in it as they have showy little flowers - rock-rose for the Brown Argus and bird's foot trefoil for the Common Blue for example - and the butterflies might come in from colonies in the area. Bird's foot trefoil also attracts the brightly coloured, black-and-orange bumblebee Bombus lapidarius and some of the day-flying moths.