Butterfly Garden Designs and Installations
Scarlet Tropical Sage, Salvia coccinea will attract butterflies and Hummingbirds!
Stokes Aster, Stokesia laevis, showy and attractive to butterflies
Lanceleaf Coreopsis, Coreopsis lanceolata, is a compact plant that brightens up the wildflower garden
Tall Ironweed, Vernonia gigantea, is a favorite that grows in sun or shade and is an excellent butterfly attractor with its purple blooms
Climbing Aster, Symphyotrichum carolinianum, has pleasant herbal aroma when it blooms in the fall
Blazing Stars, Liatris spicata, is one of many native Liatris species and is know for its outstanding fall bloom on tall stems. Bring on the butterflies!
Large plants like this Firebush, Hamelia patens, shrub can also be good attractors to butterflies and in this case, hummingbirds and songbirds
Native Blackeyed Susan, Rudbeckia hirta, is always loved
Wild Plumbago, Plumbago scandens, will make a nice low cover plant or can climb if it has a support to climb will bring the tiny Cassius Blue Butterflies
Button Sage, Lantana involucrata, is the only Lantana native to central Florida and is a tough shrub with small white to pale pink to pale lavendar flowers
Wood Sage, Teucrium canadense, is a seasonal bloomer in the summer, pretty as they are, can spread aggressively.
Rosinweed or Rosinflower, Silphium astericus, blooms most of the year and is an enduring perennial
Blanketflower, Gaillardia pulchella, is a tough annual with showy flowers and high drought tolerance
Beach Mistflower, Ageratum litteralis, will bring on the skippers and makes a good low cover plant or potted plant that will cascade down a pot
The blooms of Shiny Coffee shrubs with their woodland musk will attract many pollinators including Florida’s state butterfly, Zebra Heliconia (Zebra Longwing)
Remember that shrubs and trees like this Fiddlewood, Citharexylum spinosum, will attract butterflies too
Wild Petunia, Ruellia caroliniensis, is a very easy and dependable small wildflower to grow. It is larval (host) plant for Common Buckeye Butterflies
Dwarf Salt Bush, Baccharis dioica, draws Peacock butterflies to the buds even before the flowers open
Partridge Pea, Chamaecrista fasciculata, is a larval (host) plant for for ceraunus blue, cloudless sulphur, little yellow and gray hairstreak butterflies
Don’t forget the native Passion flowers like this Corkystem Passion Flower, Passiflora suberosa. They are larval plants for Florida state butterflies, Zebra Heliconia, and common Gulf Fritillary
South Florida’s Pineland Lantana, Lantana depressa, is a popular plant for butterfly gardeners
Native milkweeds like this White Swamp Milkweed, Asclepias perennis, should be the first choice preference for gardeners trying to support Monarch butterflies. Because they like moist soil, most gardeners are best growing these in pots with improved potting mix and regular watering
Wet loving Buttonbush will bring the butterflies to their sweet smelling blooms in the summer.
Pond edge plants like this Pickerelweed, Pontederia cordata, are beautiful butterfly attractors
Native Cassia shrubs like this Privet Cassia, Senna ligustrina, are host plants for cloudless sulphur, sleepy orange and the introduced orange-barred sulphur butterflies
Bahama Cassia, Senna mexicana ‘chapmnanii’, with an Orange-barred Sulphur caterpillar
Porterweed, Stachytarpheta jamaicensis, is always a favorite of butterfly gardeners. Be sure it is native!
Dotted Horsemint, Monarda punctata, is an incredibly tough and beautiful Bee Balm that also brings in the butterflies
Water Hyssop, Bacopa monneiri, needs consistantly moist to wet conditions and can be a great pond or potted plant. It is a host plant for Peacock butterflies. The caterpillar is pictured here
