Avoid This Mistake When Growing Milkweed If You Want To Attract Butterflies

Milkweed is a gorgeous native North American species that has multiple benefits for your garden, as well as a special relationship with the vulnerable monarch butterfly. That's because milkweed provides vital food and breeding habitat for monarchs. As the news that monarchs are at risk has spread, there's been a massive push to grow milkweed in our gardens to provide a valuable host plant and food source for these beloved insects. It's estimated that we need as many as 1.8 billion more milkweed plants across the U.S. to help save the monarch butterfly. However, well-intentioned gardeners have been making the common mistake of overwatering their milkweed while the plants are dormant, which can cause root rot and kill the plant.

Monarch butterflies are a vulnerable species due to a variety of factors that include habitat loss and a decline in wild milkweed. This makes it vital to plant milkweed and learn how to grow it correctly. However, it's essential to remember that milkweed is a wild plant, meaning it functions more like a weed than an ornamental plant you might buy at your local nursery. Most milkweed species thrive in dry conditions with poor soils, meaning they do not need much to survive — especially not too much water.

There are more than 100 species of milkweed in the U.S. The most common is Asclepias syriaca, or common milkweed. Many milkweed species like dry, sunny conditions and do not need any additional soil enrichment. However, if your soil is more clay-based and doesn't have the best drainage, you may want to amend the soil to ensure that the milkweed roots don't get waterlogged.

Over the winter, your milkweed plants will die back and become dormant. Come springtime, gardeners may mistakenly overwater their dormant milkweed plants to get them to regrow faster. However, it's key to remember that these are typically late spring to early summer bloomers and are not among the first plants to emerge. Furthermore, because most milkweeds thrive in well-drained soils, overwatering may lead to root rot that could kill the plant. Instead, you will generally want to let them be and only water when the top two inches of soil is bone dry. Even then, be sure not to soak the plants too much. Remember, they're considered weeds because they act like weeds, so less really is more for milkweed.

Though people are well-intentioned when they plant milkweed for monarchs, some mistakes can prove to be fatal for both the plant and the butterfly. Aside from overwatering, people may make the mistake of spraying their butterfly garden with pesticides to get rid of a different invader. Nevertheless, they can easily end up killing all of the pollinators that visit their garden, including monarchs.

Another mistake many gardeners make is planting non-native milkweed. Non-native milkweed can severely impact the health and well-being of monarch butterflies for generations to come. The tropical milkweed Asclepias currassavica, which is sometimes falsely or mistakenly sold as native milkweed at nurseries, can disrupt the migratory pattern of monarchs by tricking them into another breeding season. Outside of its native habitat, tropical milkweed may also carry a parasite known as Ophryocystis elektroscirrha (OE), which can weaken a butterfly's wings and keep them from migrating. So, if you are going to plant milkweed, be sure to plant milkweed that is truly native to your region to best support migrating monarchs.