How do I attract Monarchs?

[AMKuska]

I didn't realize monarch butterflies actually existed in Washington. On my recent trip to eastern washington I spent twenty minutes trying to photograph the first one I've seen in 15 years. It decided not to be photographed, but now that I know they exist here I'm determined to set up a little butterfly garden to hopefully attract them.

Any thoughts on what to plant?

 

[Carol Dee]

Any of the many milk weeds, the ones that are native to your area and butterfly bush/ butterfly weed. I noticed several on my butterfly bush/butterfly weed yesterday.
Here is one on a butterfly weed (photo borrowed from internet.)

 

[so lucky]

Yes, and I think the common milkweed, which grows tall, with pink blossoms, is their favorite. You need an area that you don't mind looking wild/weedy. I intended to purchase some seeds of the common milkweed to plant this year, but got sidetracked, and I couldn't get DH to commit to an area that he wouldn't mow down. Maybe I'll get started on it earlier for next year.
Of course, a search in the country should reveal some milkweed seed pods pretty soon, and I can get them for free.

 

[AMKuska]

My husband, the lawn curator, is very unlikely to let me have a weedy space, but that butterfly bush looks okay. I have an overgrown corner in the garden just begging for some pot of something, I bet I could make those look respectable!

 

[Carol Dee]

My husband, the lawn curator, is very unlikely to let me have a weedy space, but that butterfly bush looks okay. I have an overgrown corner in the garden just begging for some pot of something, I bet I could make those look respectable!

I have it in orange and yellow

I am hoping to add the purple (called swamp milkweed.)

 

[digitS']

@AMKuska , if you have been in WA state for 15 years and had not seen Monarchs until recently, I'm not sure if your odds improve much by crossing the Cascades. Maybe. ... along the Columbia?

Butterflies have a tendency to show up where they "don't belong," I have noticed. It's not that Monarchs don't belong here but that I must be at some extreme end of their range. Wikipedia's arrows on the map don't really reach this far (link). About the year before last, there was one in the garden. It was like the first of October but a very nice day. He really should not have been so far north!

Don't neglect the butterflies that are more likely to be here like the swallowtail, admiral, skipper, and
fritillary. Some of the same plants that attract monarchs will probably work for them. I notice most butterfly activity around a few plants in my flower garden, notably sweet William and asclepias.

http://wdfw.wa.gov/living/butterflies/ .

Steve

 

[Smart Red]

Butterfly bushes and other flowers that attract monarchs are great for sighting the adults flitting about in the garden. However, if you want to have butterflies rear their families in your gardens you will need plants that the juvenile larva like to eat because that's where the eggs are laid.

That means growing butterfly weed and milkweed. That means letting those 'weedy' plants stand overwintering in your garden space. That means a space that's a bit messy and disheveled somewhere in the yard. I do 'harvest' the seed pods rather than letting them float throughout the area and there seem to be some butterfly weed plants that don't set fruit after flowering...My orange flowers set seed, my white and pink did not.

 

[valley ranch]

Let me tell you about Monarchs~ well really about Momma's Weeping Willow Tree~Momma always wanted a Weeping Willow~so Pappa planted one up on the hill~it grew to be a enormous beauty of a tree```
Then Monarchs from the world over it seemed came to the tree and it was like a Disney movie~they laid their eggs and soon worms began eating the willow leaves~then they would crawl or drop and begin eating every thing else before sealing themselves into a hard looking cocoon~ these would hatch and they would fly to the Willow Tree and it would look like Disney again```

Father fought them~the worms~ with burning rags on a pole and sprayed but they couldn't be discouraged'''''''he finally cut down the tree~he said it would have been OK if they just ate the tree but they came in such great numbers they ate almost everything else```


Maybe if you planted a Weeping Willow Tree```


Richard

 

[Smart Red]

Whew, what a story! I'd never noticed them on or around the neighbor's tree. Could it be a regional "THING"?

 

[valley ranch]

Hi Red, It was something to see~saw it with my own eyes~I thought it was great~but the toll on the rest of the garden~was```This was in the Gardena, California area~poppa built mama a house up on the hill when brother Johnie moved into the big house~it was a ranching~farming area then.