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Cater To Those Monarch Caterpillars! - Page 3

© Naomi Mathews

Butterflies certainly don't require much food or water for survival, nor much special care from the gardener. Just the sweet nectar from your flowers, a lot of sunshine and a place to bask, shelter from the wind and cold, a puddle or two, and a host plant on which to lay their eggs! What creature could demand less from their landlord?

But oh, those creeping, crawling caterpillars! They are starving, munching, crunching, grinding little eating machines! From the moment they hatch, they begin to eat. And they don't stop eating until they slowly enter their next life stage called the pupa, or chrysalis stage. It is during this life stage--after the caterpillar has devoured all the food it can possibly find or hold--that its chrysalis slowly opens. Finally, the adult butterfly with its wrinkled wet wings slips out of its now useless chrysalis to stretch out and dry those beautiful wings. Only then can it fly high into the air, then once again repeat this miraculous cycle.

Do you now see the need to cater to those caterpillars?

Butterflies, caterpillars, and plants have had a very special inter-connection since the beginning of time. It is so special that one cannot survive properly without the other. Just as the butterfly depends upon nectar from the flower blossoms in your garden, so the plants in your garden depend partially upon the butterfly to help them perform their miraculous pollination process. After this cycle has been completed, your plants can also return year after year and serve again as "host plants" to cater to your caterpillars.

Once more, this marvelous inter-connective cycle is complete. Isn't Mother Nature absolutely perfect?

Sometimes it isn't easy for the aspiring butterfly gardener to decide what to plant to attract Monarchs to their gardens. Will it be butterfly "bushes" or butterfly "weeds?" Nurseries and garden centers usually sell both of these plants, thus making this decision even more confusing for the gardener. Yet, these two plants really are totally different!

A word of explanation may be in order here. The butterfly bush, also known as the Buddleia Davidii or summer lilac, is an excellent nectar source plant for many species of butterflies including the Monarch. Butterflies are known to literally swarm to this lovely bush to dine. Whereas the butterfly weed, commonly known as Asclepias or milkweed, is the host plant for Monarchs. The Monarch caterpillar is totally dependent upon the butterfly weed for its food source.

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