Butterfly Bush Replacements?
Forum Archives
hollysue
Location: Washington, Southwestern
Posted: Apr-30-2005 at 8:12pm
Hi everyone!
After all the discussion here lately, I have made the decision to yank my two butterfly bushes. My SO is very distraught - he doesn't want to see them go - but we don't have time to vigilantly police the deadheading process, so...
Please give me your recommendations on possible replacements. I'm especially looking for something to replace the fragrance-ness, which is what we'll miss the most.
One bed has Echinacea 'Magnum', Rudbeckia 'Goldsturm' and Autumn Joy sedum with a huge butterfly bush in the middle, so I'm especially wanting to fill that void.
I've looked a bit at Ceanothus, but they don't seem to be fragrant (although they are beautiful!).
Any suggestions?
Thanks!
holly
Fern
Location: Washington, Western Cascade Foothills
Posted: May-01-2005 at 3:14pm
If you go to the Washinton state invasive species coalition web site they have a list of alternatives. There is a link to it on the "invasive plant vs noxious weed" thread. I think Ceanothus is a good choice and it has a chapperal, sage brush type of smell. They are blooming now so go to a local garden center and see what you think. Fragrance is in the nose of the beholder. For perfume the whole yard fragrance I also like the mock orange and the witch hazel. I going to try growing a clematis, one of the vitacellias that you can cut down to the ground each year, on my witch hazel this year to try and get some summer color on it too.
Fern
DebbieTT
Location: Washington, Kitsap Peninsula
Posted: May-01-2005 at 4:32pm
To feed the butterflies plus provide food for some of their larva I highly recommend our native Spirea. Just site them carefully as they do tend to spread, but if you have a wet or wild area these are perfect.
Lisa A
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: May-02-2005 at 9:24am
Hi hollysue, I have a list of alternatives but I'll need to locate it for you (in my quest to find the article about Critter Control, my piles were disturbed and my apparent-only-to-me order is now out of order). I'll post as soon as I find it.
sparklemama
Location: Western Washington
Posted: May-03-2005 at 9:49am
fern that is a great idea for your witch hazel. I have clematis Caraby climbing a forsythia that i pruned the lower branches off to make a tree, to add some summer color and it was beautiful last summer. I have Arnolds Promise witch hazel in the front yard and i think I am going to plant a clemmie to climb up into it. thanks for the good idea!
Wanda
Location: Puget Sound corridor
Posted: May-03-2005 at 12:32pm
Also, a structure like an obelisk with a fragrant climbing rose might be just the ticket. Let us know what you decide.
-Wanda
mdvaden
Location: Oregon, Western
Posted: May-03-2005 at 4:31pm
I like the Ceanothus. In fact, I watch the bees on mine everyday. They just zip around the flowers and leave us alone.
Thought of a harlequin glorybower?
Purple smoke tree - Cotinus?
M.D. Vaden
basilgirl
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: May-03-2005 at 9:41pm
growing a later blooming clematis in a forsynthia is AWSOME! I love my forsynthia for 1 month, then get frustrated with it, what a great way to love it longer!
Lisa A
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: May-04-2005 at 10:57am
It's taking me longer to find sufficient info, or more correctly, I'm finding quite a bit but I need time to sift through it to see if all suggestions are appropriate substitutes for our area. In the meantime, here's the link to possible substitutes for butterfly bush c/o Invasive Species Coalition: butterfly bush info and substitutions. It's a pdf, hope you can open that kind. (This is the link Fern referred to above).
LeAnn
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: May-10-2005 at 5:39pm
Just a note about the Ceanothus: we had two large beautiful Ceanothus that were amazingly fragrant in their clean, bright way. The plants themselves emitted the clean scent. Unfortunately, they were too happy in the wrong place and grew way too big: much wider than any butterfly bush. They were great shrubs though!
JeanneK
Location: Oregon, Greater Portland Metro
Posted: May-11-2005 at 8:00am
I love my ceanothus also! The bees love them too. I love the small, glossy leaves. Butterfly bushes can also get quite bushy with regular pruning. What about a lilac (syringa) for training a clematis into for summer bloom? Lilacs smell great too.
Jeanne
hollysue
Location: Washington, Southwestern
Posted: May-13-2005 at 11:25pm
Thanks for all the great suggestions (Sorry it took me so long to get back here!). I will definitely keep looking into a Ceanothus, although I'm also thinking of trying to find the native mock orange. I ran across a dwarf Viburnum, and the SO has always wanted a "snowball bush" so that may take up residence here too.
Holly
bakingbarb
Location: Washington, Western
Posted: May-14-2005 at 9:08am
In looking at replacment plants, are they as attractive to butterlies for nectar? But I did notice the butterfly bush is not much of a host plant, so is there any shrub that does both. I had my heart set on a b.bush this summer so I need something to fit the bill there. I did plant a climbing honeysuckle and am excited about that though!
btw, pdf files tend to bind up my computer!!!
~BakingBarb
cjmiller
Location: Oregon, Willamette Valley
Posted: May-14-2005 at 4:26pm
For a bright yellow spot I really like a ninebark (physocarpus opulifolius) which grows slowly to about 6 ft or if you want dark bronze/purple that will grow taller, faster, go for an elderberry (sambucus nigra) there is also a variagated sambucus almost white to creamy white mixed with soft apple green. all three of these plants have flowers and berries and birds like them too. I think both elderberry bushes would make a fine trellis for clematis.
Carol
Phlox
Location: Washington, Southwestern
Posted: May-15-2005 at 5:04pm
A couple more suggestions...
Pink Princess Escallonia only supposed to get 6'tall, 5' wide. When mature will flower year round and the butterflies like the pink fragrant flowers.
How about a Clethra alnifolia rosea? REAL fragrant and can be trimed to the heighth you like.
Interesting about the Ceanothus. Mine is a ground cover type and was full of wonderful blooms this year, didn't notice a fragrance though, didn't know it had one. Beautiful evergreen.
bakingbarb
Location: Washington, Western
Posted: May-16-2005 at 8:30pm
Phlox, good suggestions of escallonia and clethra. I am not real big on the spirea normally. The butterflybush is so striking and needs something equally wow to fill the bill.
~BakingBarb
bakingbarb
Location: Washington, Western
Posted: May-16-2005 at 8:37pm
Ok so I went and looked up the pic for the native spirea and it is so pretty when it flowers but that plant looks awful the rest of the time. It also seems to get quite large. Granted the bb can get large too. I think the clethra is the prettiest of the choices.
I wonder, do we grow sassafras here? It is a host plant to caterpillars. Such a pretty tree too although it can be weedy.
~BakingBarb
Fern
Location: Washington, Western Cascade Foothills
Posted: May-17-2005 at 9:12am
I'm thinking about putting an Eucalyptus moorei nana in place of my butterfly bush. It is part of a screen so being evergreen is important to me, and I also need the fine texture and grey foliage. It is a small eucalyptus and it's height of 10 feet is good, I hope it doesn't get much bigger and is really cold hardy enough. The only bad thing is that it doesn't have showy flowers. What do you think about putting a blue potato vine in it? That would give me late flowering purple flowers. I know someone who is growing it very close to me, right out in the open, so it must be hardier [ to zone 7b] than I first thought. It's not like a group 3 clematis so I might have trouble getting them to co-exist. The native spiraea has nice flowers that insects love but I already have some at the edge of our woods and the foliage is pretty dull.
I'd like clethra someday. I tried one once but it was too dry and shady for it. They do like water! Maybe back by the wild spiraeas.
Fern
Gardening for the Homebrewer: Grow and Process Plants for Making Beer, Wine, Gruit, Cider, Perry, and More
By co-authors Debbie Teashon (Rainy Side Gardeners) and Wendy Tweton