After a long winter, the butterflies of spring and summer are already on the wing, returning from their winter sojourn and headed your way. Providing key plants to suit their appetites ensures that you’ll have these beauties with you all season. But first, do you know your butterflies and when to expect them?
Beautiful flyers arriving early and late
Nothing loves a garden more than a butterfly. Their lifespan is variable – some live for less than a month, while others can remain for a year in your garden. They seldom rest, clinging to trees and shrubs only when drenched by rain or buffeted in stiff winds. Their agenda includes cruising for nectar-producing flowers, finding a suitable mate and locating appropriate plants on which to lay their eggs. Inadvertently, butterflies are helpful pollinators, moving pollen from one tree or plant to another and increasing human food crops.
Uninvited but always welcome, the first of the season’s flutterers make an unexpectedly early spring appearance when leaf buds are beginning to open on bare branches. It’s unlikely timing for such delicate creatures, but butterflies are guided by instinct and demonstrate impressive grit as they persevere through the weather elements.
The earliest butterfly which you’ll likely encounter is the North American Mourning Cloak butterfly (Nymphalis antiopa), also known in Great Britain as the Camberwell Beauty or the White Petticoat. It unexpectedly appears in the first calendar days of spring, cruising over melting snow patches or settling on a sunny stone with wings spread four inches wide. This magnificent butterfly has impressive deep burgundy wings with a fancy yellow skirting and iridescent sapphire blue dots. When spotted in spring, it is already a year old, having wintered under loose tree bark or in crevices. It feeds on running tree sap, ripe or fallen fruits and secretions from garden aphids. The Mourning Cloak male is polymorphous, mating with as many females as possible. He will select a favourable site for attracting potential mates and is prepared to rigorously defend the location against other males with similar intentions.
The Small White butterfly (Pieris rapae) is best known as the Cabbage White and is sure to be found in any garden-growing space. They appear in the first warm days of spring and stay around through early autumn. Though tiny, Cabbage Whites have extraordinary energy with an average wingbeat of 12.8 per second, carrying them in scurrying flight through gardens. Often seen in pairs or small clusters, Cabbage Whites are fierce competitors, frequently engaged in aerial combat to drive others out of choice territory. They cruise a wide selection of flowers for nectar and always select a cabbage-related plant such as cabbage, broccoli or cauliflower on which to lay their eggs. Their chalk-white wings are each marked with a single dark dot; those with double dots on each wing are females.
A little further into spring, the first of the several categories of orange-spotted butterflies begin to visit. The Red Admiral (Vanessa atalanta) has black wings two to three inches across and is streaked with vibrant orange bands and scattered white dots. They are gregarious flyers and can maintain friendly relations with others of their kind. You might see one casually investigating early summer flowers or encounter large groups sharing emerging blossoms of scented viburnum and lilac shrubs. Red Admirals have a relaxed attitude toward humans and will often settle on light-coloured clothing, sitting for several minutes to rest their wings.
The dramatic swallowtail butterflies are classically beautiful and appear in mid-May through early July. They are strong flyers found in all provinces and extend their range to north of the Arctic Circle in Yukon. The Canadian Tiger Swallowtail (Papilio canadensis) has butter-yellow wings with black tiger stripes and measures up to four inches across. They often visit suburban gardens and, after summer rain, are enthusiastic mud puddlers. The hatched eggs (larvae) of Swallowtail butterflies feed on the leaves of their host plant; adults eat from the nectar of lilacs, sweet grass, goldenrod, daisies and tufted vetch. They also relish herbal plants in flower and will visit potted herbs on a patio if the flowers have been allowed to remain.
The Black Swallowtail is slightly larger than its tiger-streaked cousin and has four-inch wings of deepest black widely bordered with yellow, orange and sapphire blue. It’s a truly magnificent butterfly! If you notice a gorgeous black butterfly hovering over its preferred plants of parsley, dill or fennel, that is a female looking for a suitable site to lay her eggs. Let her finish her work and later, carefully look for pale green eggs. They will mature into large, yellow-and-black striped caterpillars, laid down on the plants that will nourish the developing generation.
Arriving in late summer through early autumn is the orange, black and white Painted Lady (Vanessa cardui) butterfly, also known as The Cosmopolitan. The Painted Lady is slightly smaller than the iconic Monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus), arriving shortly after. The big and bold Monarchs will show boisterous attention to late-summer flowers, with several feeding together as they bulk up energy for flight. Monarchs don’t hibernate in the north but make the long trip to South America in early autumn.
Butterflies eat a liquid diet, taking sugar from tree sap and flower nectar, and soil minerals diluted in mud puddles. You can increase butterfly visits to your garden from spring through autumn by providing the key plants that they favour. Oak, birch, willow and dogwood trees provide sweet bark sap. Spring-flowering shrubs such as viburnum, rhododendron and lilac, as well as all fruiting trees such as hackberry, cherry and apple are sources for early-flower nectar.
Summer perennials with nectar for butterflies include blazing star (Liatris), phlox, shasta daisy, black-eyed Susan, bee balm (Monarda), butterfly bush (Buddleia davidii), stonecrop (Sedum), purple coneflower (Echinacea), Joe Pye weed, yarrow and lupines. Summer-flowering annuals are also attractive to butterflies. Herbs of every kind will invite butterflies if the plants are allowed to flower. Butterflies also look for water sources and take sips from the edge of a bird bath or shallow saucer of muddy water.
By Judith Adam
