So you have a butterfly garden and of course want more butterfly visitors then forget replanting your Bradford Pear(s) then and try perhaps a American Plum (Prunus americana) tree. I have seen many many butterflies on the flowers which bloom for about 2 weeks each year in late March and early April when there`s no other nectar sources to be found in mass. Butterflies I have seen on my American "Wild" Plum include Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, Spicebush Swallowtail, Cabbage White, Falcate Orangetip, Great Purple Hairstreak, Henry`s Elfin, Eastern Pine Elfin, White M Hairstreak, Gray Hairstreak, Red-banded Hairstreak, Spring Azure, American Snout, Question Mark, Eastern Comma, Mourning Cloak, American Lady, Red Admiral, Common Buckeye, Sleepy Duskywing and Juvenal`s Duskywing. Also it is a host plant to Coral Hairstreak and Viceroy butterflies which is another plus for this native tree.

American Plum (Prunus americana) grows fairly slow usually to 25-35 feet tall and 20 feet wide and can form a thicket of trees if left unattended (this will really bring in the butterflies). Another reason I like American Plum is its fragrance a few days a year it can be quite intoxicating not to mention the masses of butterflies covering it. It requires partial shade to full sun and no special planting needs, the leaves turn yellow and drop very early in the fall and present no ice hazard at all. In July it has small plums that can be quite tasty if the squirrels leave any, if left to rot then Question Mark, Eastern Comma and Red-spotted Purple can be found on them as well.

To make this tree a ornamental you will have to keep it at bay with moderate pruning of limbs and suckers at the base once or twice a year. You can easily propagate it with cuttings.

Buying American Plum is a problem as most nurseries have several kinds of ornamental plums and likely would not know one from the other. you might try this web site Native Plants Vendor List for North Carolina: you will find a comprehensive list of nurseries with addresses and phone numbers for most of the United States.

For more info on American Plum try these sites Tree Guide and Prunus Americana Fact Sheet

Other native trees to attract butterflies you might consider are:

Black Willow (Salix nigra): Although not a flowering tree it is a host plant to many butterflies like Mourning Cloak, Viceroy and Red-spotted Purple. See the excellent page at Ohio Trees from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and also the Black Willow page.

Chickasaw Plum (Prunus angustifolia): A thicket forming plum which can be quite thorny it is a much shorter growing tree and can grow into huge thickets. Its likely the best butterfly early spring nectar source in the Carolinas. This tree doesn't grow very pretty and is not for those who want the "perfect" garden. I have seen around 30 butterfly species on this tree and have found wild thickets that were acres in size.

Eastern Redbud (Cercis canadensis): A beautiful spring bloomer that attracts many butterflies and is host plant for Henry's Elfin. One of my personal favorites and an abundant native in my yard, great for woodland edges.See the web page on Eastern Redbuds at Trees of Alabama and the Southeast and see more on redbuds on a page from Dendrology at Virginia Tech

Flowering Dogwood (Cornus florida): A beautiful flowering tree that the flowers are eaten by Spring Azure caterpillars. Ohio Trees has an excellent page on Flowering Dogwood as well.

Juneberry or Serviceberry(Amelanchier sp.): I"d never heard of them, I learned of them from Bob Perkins. I found this web page at eat-it.com on Juneberries and fond that I did indeed know of them as Serviceberry which I savored the fruit on a backpacking trip in West Virginia once. In the mountains they were easy to find as the local bears tend to break down the taller limbs to get to the berries. Another site on Juneberries from Plants for a Future. Paulette Haywood suggests a Service berry called 'Autumn Brilliance' (Amelanchier X grandiflora 'Autumn Brilliance') is really spectacular and available in the nursery trade. It has loads of small white blossoms in the spring which are visited by butterflies, berries in the summer which are devoured by birds, and gorgeous red fall foliage.

PawPaw (Asminia parviflora): The host plant for Zebra Swallowtail and a very tasty fruit. I found this article on Cooking with Pawpaws from the Kentucky State University Cooperative Extension Program. Don't forget the see this site from KSU called the Pawpaw Information Web Site

Persimmon (Diospyros virginiana): A fruiting tree that anglewimgs and American Buckeyes can be found eating the fruit. People and other wildlife enjoy the fruits as well. See the page on Persimmons at Ohio Trees.

Wild Cherry: A host to several butterflies like Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, Red-spotted Purple and Coral Hairstreak.

Thanks to Carolina Butterfly Society members and CarolinaLeps listserve members Nancy Baldwin, Sharon Funderburk, Paulette Haywood, Bob Perkins and Sandy Pruitt for suggestions on this article.

Randy Emmitt
Durham, NC

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