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by Adam Fulford

Butterfly host plants are those specific plants that the female adult butterfly hunts and seeks to lay her eggs on. So, she’s not only looking for nectar producing plants to quench her thirst but is also looking for those specific plants whose leaves can serve as growth food for the tiny, just-hatched caterpillar who cannot travel far to find the food it needs to grow. And the adult butterfly will therefore only lay her eggs on these plants. If she chooses the wrong host plant and the leaves of that plant cannot be used as food for the just-hatched caterpillar, it’ll not survive.

And, for the just-hatched caterpillar to grow into a full-grown caterpillar before it wraps itself into a cocoon (in readiness to emerge later as a butterfly), it has to eat voraciously. This means large ungainly patches of chewed-on leaves become visible on the host plant. Many gardeners do not like this because it renders the plant unsightly. But that’s nature. And it’s one of nature’s phenomena at work.

If there are no host plants in your garden, fewer butterflies will visit you. The solution then is to locate the host plants in an area not easily visible and yet just a short distance from the nectar plants. As a matter of fact, many trees, shrubs and other plants found growing in any common yard are suitable for caterpillar growth. For example Black Locust trees are a host plant to Silver-Spotted Skippers. Basswood trees are host plants for Tiger Swallowtails and Question Marks.

But Other Than These, Let’s Look at Some Other Important Butterfly Gardening Host Plants:

• Alfalfas are host plants for the caterpillars of Dogface Butterflies and Clouded Sulphur butterflies.
• Asters can serve as host plants to Dainty Sulphurs.
• New Jersey Tea plants are a host plant for the caterpillars of Spring/Summer Azure butterflies.
• Cassia plants sometimes serve as the host plants for Cloudless Sulphurs, Little Yellows and Sleepy Oranges.
• Hickory trees are a host plant for Banded Hairstreaks.
• Oak trees also offer sustenance and home for Banded Hairstreak and Red-spotted Purple caterpillars.
• Banded Hairstreak caterpillars sometimes even use Walnut trees as their host.
• Hibiscus flowers sometimes serve as host plants to the caterpillars of Common Checkered Skippers and Gray Hairstreaks.
• Mallows are a host plant to the American Painted Lady, Common Checkered Skipper, Gray Hairstreak and West Coast Lady.
• Marigold is a host plant for Dainty Sulphur and Black Swallowtail caterpillars.
• Milkweeds are very popular with butterflies. Monarch and Queen butterflies are born on milkweeds and attain all of their nourishment from these bountiful plants. Pearly Everlasting serves as a host plant to the American Painted Lady.
• Verbena is a host plant to the Common Buckeye caterpillars.
• Vetch flowers are hosts to Eastern Tailed Blue, Orange Sulphurs and Wild Indigo Duskywings.
• White Sweet Clovers sometimes serve as the host plants for the caterpillars of Orange Sulphur butterflies.
• Sunflowers are hosts to American Painted Lady caterpillars and Silvery Checkerspots.
• Turtlehead is a host plant for the caterpillars of the Baltimore Checkerspot butterfly.
• Plantain is a host plant to Baltimore Checkerspot and Common Buckeye.
• The host plants of American Painted Ladies are Borage, Burdock, Everlasting, Hollyhocks, Knapweed, Mallow, Sunflower and Wormwood.
• Black Swallowtails free themselves from cocoons on Carrot, Dill, Fennel, Parsley, Queen Anne’s Lace or Rue plants.
• The host plants of Cabbage White butterflies are Mustard, Broccoli, other plants in the Cabbage family or Nasturtiums.
• Clouded Sulphur caterpillars munch on Alfalfa, Clover, Senna or Cassia peas and nestle their cocoons into these plants.
• The food and host plants of Common Checkered Skipper butterflies are hibiscus, Hollyhock, velvet-leaf and mallows. Common Buckeye use Heliotrope, Monkeyflower, Plantain, Sedum, Snapdragon, Verbena as their host plants.
• Dainty Sulphur caterpillars feast on Asters, Spanish Needles, shepherd’s needle, sneezeweed, fetid marigold and cultivated marigold, then lay their cocoons on their host plants.
• Dogface Butterfly caterpillars’ host plants include False Indigo, Indigo Bush, Prairie Clover, alfalfa, clovers and indigo.
• Eastern Comma caterpillars favor Elm, Hop Vine or Nettle.
• Eastern Tailed Blue caterpillars gobble Clover, some types of pea plants, Vetch.
• Fritillaries butterfly caterpillars use Violets as their host plants. Tiger Swallowtail butterfly caterpillars feast on Aspens, Sycamore, Tulip Tree, Wild Black, Cherry, Willow and Yellow Poplars.

Tags: American Painted Lady, Banded Hairstreaks, Black Swallowtails, Cabbage White, Common Checkered Skippers, Gray Hairstreaks, Orange Sulphur, Plants