Plant Them and They Will Come

This picture was taken at the end of August in my garden. You can barely see the little bits of orange that are the migrating Monarch butterflies. I must confess that when I plan my garden, first and foremost, I'm looking for pretty flowers that bloom on easy-to-maintain, disease free plants. And, so it seems, so are the butterflies!

They just couldn't get enough of these pretty plants. I had been planning on yanking the pale mauve Eupatorium because it wasn't vibrant enough, but when I saw how much the butterflies loved it - well, it has earned a spot in the garden. This year I'm trying a Echinacea pallida (Cone Flower) from Jelitto Seeds called 'Hula Dancer'. The pallidas have much finer petals than some of the other cone flowers, and for me seem to be smaller more refined plants. So, I guess that means just one thing, I'm going to have to plant a lot more to make a show.