Flights of Fancy

My dear friend, Kelly, inspired me to start a butterfly garden. I already had the beginnings of one with butterfly friendly plants such as lantana and lavender, but I wanted to have more and better selections for monarchs during their annual migration. Selfishly, these beautiful and perennial monarch-friendly flowering plants continue to bloom through fall and live through the seasons, providing my garden with some much needed color and filler around my brick patio lounge/ entertaining area.

Hubby helped me clear out my overflow vegetable bed of long-in-the-tooth cherry tomatoes and dig holes for the incoming plants. We then placed our compost green machine in a corner of the bed so it will get full sun and will be closer to the kitchen for green waste dumping. This amended re-placement will help me start another goal for next season’s garden, composting kitchen and yard waste and using the compost to replenish nutrients to the soil in my main vegetable beds.

I placed the two Echinacea (orange and pink cone flower) nearer to the compost machine, the Purple Salvia, Dark Knight Bluebeard, and Starla Pink Pentas in the middle nearer the Anna Apple, and three Achillea (Yarrow) closer to the Mexican Sage. Interspersed between the plants are six deep pink alyssum for ground cover. Lastly, I placed a small, shallow dish of water on the ground as a butterfly bath. It looks a little thin right now, but it shouldn’t take long for the plants to fill in beautifully. The welcome mat is out! Hopefully the guests will show up soon!