Story by George Newman
Photography by Robert Tinari

American Indian legend holds that if you catch a butterfly and whisper your fondest wish, the butterfly will carry that wish to the “Great Spirit.”  Because you have helped preserve the balance of nature, and because butterflies are the “Great Spirit’s” messengers on earth, your wish will be granted.

Suppose your wish is to see more butterflies in your garden, but you don’t really want to capture one.  Not to worry.  Instead of whispering your wish to a butterfly, try taking care of the butterfly’s wishes.  Fortunately, they’re simple: sun and food, both easy to provide in Southern Maryland.  Summer brings all the sunshine a butterfly could want, while butterfly-friendly vegetation thrives.   Maryland, in fact, has an official state butterfly — the Baltimore Checkerspot — and Calvert County has adopted the Zebra Swallowtail as its official insect.

These are just two among dozens of butterfly species common to the area: swallowtails alone boast seven varieties in addition to the Zebra, according to the U.S. Geological Survey Guide to North American Butterflies.  (Butterfly information organized by state can be viewed on the survey’s web site.  Just log onto www.usgs.gov, enter “butterflies of Maryland” into the search function, and open the first link.)  While differing widely in color and markings, butterflies have pretty much the same eating habits, a plus in planning a butterfly garden.

Before you think about what you’re going to plant, think about where you’re going to plant it.  As in real estate, the key to butterfly feeding is location, location, location.  You already know that butterflies like sun.  They don’t like wind, which makes flying hard work.  And they won’t know your plants are there if you don’t make them easily visible.  So you want an open area, but one as protected as possible from the wind — no hilltops.

To let butterflies know they’ve come to the right place, plant large areas of colorful flowers.  Not all these have to be flowers that butterflies like to eat.  The color will act as your butterfly “welcome” announcement.

Once you’ve found a likely spot and planted your color come-ons, it’s time to plan the butterfly’s menu.  Like bees, butterflies feed on nectar, using a kind of folding straw called a proboscis to draw nectar from blooms. Any good garden center can give you plenty of suggestions for plants.  An excellent printed source is the Bird Watcher’s Digest publication, “Enjoying Butterflies More,” by Jeffrey Glassberg.  The gold standard of plants, if only because of its name, remains the butterfly bush (Buddleia Davidii), which blooms from July to September.  It produces bunches of tiny flowers that provide a bountiful butterfly buffet.  Other butterfly favorites include zinnias, daisies, purple coneflower, and lantana.  “Butterfly Weed” (Ascleplas Tuberosa) is a form of milkweed. In fact, butterflies like many plants that we often think of as weeds, including goldenrod and Joe Pye weed.

As we learned in fourth grade, butterflies come from caterpillars, so if you want to provide for future as well as present butterflies, your garden should include some plants that caterpillars like.   This is a more specialized enterprise, because caterpillars tend to be pickier eaters than butterflies.  Monarch caterpillars, for example, only eat milkweed, while swallowtails prefer parsley and sassafras.  Many sources, including Glassberg’s book, provide lists matching caterpillar species with plants.

Your efforts will be rewarded with some of nature’s most beautiful creatures, and you’ll understand why butterflies are the stuff of legend.