6 Plants That Beat Butterfly Bush for Your Wildlife Draw

At the late afternoon and early evening, once the summertime is its most potent, the insects are at frenzied activity. All over the backyard, the tips of flowers launch into the atmosphere — when there were such thing as an insect air traffic controller, it could have lost its mind long ago. Bees, wasps, flies, moths, beetles and butterflies work to satiate their thirst on nectar plants, while on others they collect pollen to feed their youthful miles off.

Over the native prairie plants — culver’s root, aster, boneset, coreopsis, milkweed, ironweed and American senna — the sound of wings could be heard 10 feet off. But over by the butterfly bush (Buddleja davidii), one tiger swallowtail functions the blossoms, like a tourist in a restaurant the locals never visit.

The issues With Butterfly Bush

No one believes me, not even when I post videos online. The butterfly bush sees one-tenth, even one-twentieth of this action of almost any other native plant. Sure, the occasional butterfly or bumblebee, a sphinx moth, may fly, but it’s hardly anything to write home about. Even as a nectar source, other nonnatives, such as lavender and caryopteris, get far more insects — as you are aware, insects are the base of the food chain for birds and us.

Here’s what about butterfly bush. It has shown invasive on both U.S. coasts. Not in small backyard gardens, however, birds take the seed off to the point that it is popping up in unmanaged areas and roadside places.

A native of Asia, it does not have any checks and balances at the U.S., and as a larger wildlife-supporting plant, it simply doesn’t pass muster. I understand we plant butterfly bush to help pests, but the plant’s title is just as powerful a marketing strategy as I’ve ever seen.

Benjamin Vogt / Monarch Gardens

If our goal as anglers is to love and support diverse wildlife — which I hope it’s — in combination with creating an aesthetically beautiful interpretation of nature, then we have to ask ourselves these questions: How many caterpillars do we begin feeding on butterfly bush? How many species of insect do we see sipping nectar from it, compared to other crops in the backyard?

Butterfly bush flowers limit the types of insects which may reach its nectar, but besides that the plant and nectar don’t have any evolutionary history with native insects — they are not adapted to each other, so they’re like perfect strangers. Butterfly bush blossoms for quite a while and is an easy plant to grow, but there are different plants much more beneficial to native butterflies and insects which move much farther toward attracting and keeping insect populations.

Benjamin Vogt / Monarch Gardens

Things to Plant Instead

The secret to good garden design, and substituting butterfly bush, is succession gardening. This means always getting something in bloom from spring through fall. When one key pollinator plant stops blooming, another turns on to take its place.

This way we could mimic the very long bloom time of butterfly bush, which aids our backyard aesthetically while profiting insects. I’m going to run down a list of plants native to a large portion of the central and eastern U.S., but you should always confirm what is native to you. (See the websites for The Xerces Society, the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center or Pollinator Partnership for helpful lists and guides.)

So here’s the order I would go with and what I would use in areas with the medium to dry dirt (clay to loam) and full sun conditions butterfly bush thrives in. And take, I’ve even tried to pick purple-blooming plants to mimic the most frequent bloom colour of butterfly bush.

Benjamin Vogt / Monarch Gardens

Pasque flower (Pulsatilla patens, USDA zones 4 to 9; find your zone) blossoms in April in arid clay soil, and even rocky or sandy land. It’s a slowly spreading clump that blossoms for a few weeks and has about a foot tall. The subsequent seed heads are very decorative, and it is a fun, fuzzy plant to touch; the hairs protect it from cold spring nights.

Benjamin Vogt / Monarch Gardens

Should you require structure and height, allow me to introduce you to the drought-tolerant shrub southern arrowwood (Viburnum dentatum, zones 3 to 8). It’s covered in white blossoms in May; late summer brings a flush of blue berries adore; and the fall color is bright red, yellow or orange, depending on the cultivar. It also is a host plant for several caterpillar species. It thrives in dry to medium clay full to partial sun, becoming to about 6 feet tall and wide after eight years, and it’ll reach a bit taller then.

Missouri Botanical Garden

Pale purple coneflower (Echinacea simulata, zones 5 to 8) is among the earliest-blooming coneflower species — if you do not have several of the species, you’re missing a great diversity of blossoms over a significantly longer time than that which exactly E. purpurea may give you. What makes E. simulata unique is the very bright yellow pollen. This coneflower enjoys dry to medium clay soil and full to partial sun; it gets 2 to 3 feet tall and 1 foot wide.

Jocelyn H. Chilvers

Purple prairie clover(Dalea purpurea, zones 3 to 9) is a midsummer-blooming plant which brings in the pests like nothing else. At only a foot to two feet tall and wide, it thrives in drier soils in full to partial sun. There is also a white clover, Dalea candida, if you prefer to moon garden (do not moon your garden; I suggest if you prefer white flowers at night once the celestial moon is out).

Missouri Botanical Garden

Tall blazing star (Liatris aspera, zones 3 to 8) is a late-summer to early-fall bloomer that’s about 1 foot wide and 3 to 4 feet tall. It grows in dry to medium clay soil and full sun, and it is a carefree perennial which attracts in butterflies like its own monarch-attracting cousin Liatris ligulistylis, zones 3 to 6.

Benjamin Vogt / Monarch Gardens

And last but absolutely not least is aromatic aster (Aster oblongifolius, zones 3 to 10), shown in the background here. A tiny shrublike perennial at 2 to 3 feet wide and two feet tall, so it blooms forever and ever from September into October with bluish-purplish flowers. It gets lots of late-season pollinator action, particularly from those pests which are migrating or getting ready to hibernate.

So there is a good start for you to replace a butterfly bush with native plants which are as easy to care for but support a larger number and diversity of pollinating insects. Remember, your regional options may be different than those plants, but they’ll be not as rewarding for wildlife in your area.

Will you rethink your butterfly bush? What plants native to your area do you love?

More: Why Native Plants Make Gardening Much Better

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