Alana - do you want butterfly host plants or just nectar plants, or both? I'm assuming this is a sunny area, right? The butterfly bush may provide some shade eventually, too. Asters are good for fall bloom and come in a variety of colors. Liatris - good nectaring for lots of different species. You can usually get a pack of 25 for about $4-5.00. What kind of lilies did you get? Asiatics bloom first and then orientals. Lilium formosanum is a fall blooming lily that is quite lovely, too. You can plant some daffodils and hyacinth as well for early spring blooms. Amsonias are great for mid-late spring blooms, with blue starry flowers, and brilliant yellow foliage color in fall. Good nectar plant. Do you have any milkweed planted for the Monarchs? It's their host plant. Tropical is an annual, but reseeds in my zone 7. There is the red/yellow flowering, and the yellow flowering. They start blooming around now, and continue to bloom until frost. You can use Rue as a grouping, or edging plant. It's pretty with blue-green foliage, and is the host plant for both Black Swallowtails and Giant Swallowtails. Rue can cause contact dermatitus for some people. It doesn't bother me. If you want to put in a trellis, you can grow a passion vine or pipevine. Passion vines are a host plant for Gulf Fritillaries, and pipevine is for the Pipevine Swallowtails. Passion flowers also attract hummingbirds in my garden. Scattering some seed of Cleomes will serve as nectar plants and hosts for the Cabbage Whites. They reseed, but don't make a nuisance. There are white, pink, lavendar flowered cleomes. A lavendar would give you sweet fragrance and blooms that attract lots of butterflies. I have lavendar x intermedia 'Provence'. Needs very dry, neutral soil. The tropical milkweed also attracts hummers in my zone 7 garden. Fennel, either bronze or green, will give you some variation in structure in your garden, and it hosts Black Swallowtails as well. There are just so many, hard to mention all. Check out our FAQs for recommended nectar and host plants. Susan

In our community gardens, a wide variety of milkweeds are offered to the Monarchs. Every year they are covered with cats during different times of the year. It's very common to find a chrysalis hanging from a garden border 2x6 or from horizontal vine supports or any number of different plant stems. It is extremely rare to find any of them on the host plants though, as the little cats seem to want to wander off to do their magic. I'm sure there are predations, but I've photographed any of the beautiful little encasinga and even had the privilege of watching the last instar unzip into the bright green chrysalis. Up until that point I wasn't sure exactly how it happened and it was amazing and surprisingly quick! It takes me a bit of searching to find them at this point because they are so well camouflaged.

Hi Steve, Sorry I missed you but stop by some time and I will give you a tour of the tiny yard. It is amazing how many plants I have managed to squeeze into it. I have even crammed in a number of trees although I have to keep them cut back in the spring or I would have no room for any of the other guys. Speaking of echinacea, I have never had a whole lot of it but it is because I NEVER saw a butterfly on the ones that I had and I didn't want to waste space which I have so little of. But last weekend I went to visit family in Belmont and they had a next-door neighbor who had several hundred of the purple ones all planted together and there were lots of skippers and lady butterflies on them so I guess number counts. Anyway, at the moment what I see most of all is skippers, hairstreaks, ladies, painted and west coast and a monarch or two along with an occasional pipe vine swallowtail. I am a little concerned about not seeing more monarchs by now but I am hoping that will improve. I have a variety of milkweed plants which have tons of seeds you are welcome to and I have started some pipe vine seedlings you can have also though they are not the CA variety. I have not had success getting the native vine seeds to germinate. The ones I have are Aristolochia durior which are native to the east but they grow much more rapidly so I have planted them as well out there. Some of the butterfly species mentioned in other posts aren't native here which is sad because many of them are really beautiful but we do have some great ones that are very rewarding to see in the yard. Murray

Thanks Terrene! I have zinnias, tithonia, verbena bonariensis and two Pink Delight butterfly bushes. I have never gotten even one seedling from my butterfly bushes on our entire property so they stay, although I'm not going to plant any more. I'm afraid if I plant another variety, they could pollinate each other. Verbena bonariensis reseeds very heavily for me but only right under the plants so I'm not getting rid of that either. The seedlings come up almost as thick as grass They bloom their heads off all summer even though I don't thin them at all. I just let them duke it out. There is always a constant swarm of Buckeyes and Variegated Fritillaries on them but the larger butterflies such as Swallowtails and Monarchs were mostly going to my zinnias. It's wonderful that one of the easiest and cheapest things to grow is also one of the best things to plant for butterflies. I plan to plant a lot of zinnias next summer. We have an 8 acre hayfield that has a long line of trees along the north property line and I'd like to plant some native perennials along the south side of that tree line. I will have to use stuff that's pretty drought tolerant because the tree roots make the soil dry in late summer. The perennials would get plenty of sun though. I can water until they're established but don't want to plant stuff that I'd have to water forever. Do you have to keep your Cup Plant watered in the summer Terrene? I think I'll add that one to my wish list. I already have Liatris ligulystylis on there. : ) I have Silphium laciniatum (Compass Plant) on my wish list as well. If you have both and the Cup Plant seems to be more attractive to butterflies than Compass Plant, I should probably stick to that.