Summer notes from the back yard

Lorraine Julien | Aug 26, 2015

With all the talk about dwindling Monarch butterfly populations, I wanted to help in some small way, starting this summer, by having more butterfly friendly flowers in my garden. I started bugging (pardon the pun) garden centres in April and finally was able to purchase milkweed plants by late June. Some of the wild milkweed plants can apparently get quite invasive and literally take over a small garden so I had to be careful when selecting the plants. I notice there are still lots of wild milkweed plants in lake country and also in ravine, park and conservation areas around cities but so much farmland has been covered by development that the plants that are left are just not enough to sustain the Monarch populations.

I was thrilled when one day last month I happened to be in the garden and noticed a Monarch butterfly flitting around and looking as though it was lost. It flew from flower to flower but eventually found the milkweed plants as you can see from the accompanying photo. I thought “Wow, they’ve found my plants!” Since that first day I’ve been checking the underside of the leaves for eggs but nothing so far. It seems to me that the plants may have to be more mature before the butterflies lay their eggs. I hope next year will produce some results.

One big mistake was made in placing the milkweed near the base of our birdfeeder. I came out one morning to find some of the plants had been trampled and the stalks broken off – I’m sure the culprits were some raccoons that were partying the previous night (they party a lot!). The bird feeder pole is very frustrating for squirrels and raccoons as there is a hanging baffle on a spring that pretty well stops anything from climbing the pole…still the raccoons keep trying and trying as evidenced by the muddy footprints on the bottom section of the pole. So far, they haven’t been able to get beyond the baffle. Next spring I’ll move the milkweed to a safer, less busy area of the garden.

Earlier this year, we moved the bird feeder from an area near the deck to a better location in the garden. Some of the spilled sunflower seeds sprouted and grew into some pretty sunflowers. In other years, I’ve left the sunflower heads to dry and provide food for the fall and winter but, to my surprise, the goldfinches and black squirrels have already eaten nearly all the seeds from the flower heads. The finches and the squirrel were so intent on digging out the seeds that I was able to snap pictures from just a few feet away.

Already there are lots of plans for next year’s “backyard oasis”!