Native Milkweed Plants For Monarch Butterflies. These findings suggest that the efforts of individual gardeners to plant milkweed either wild type native plants or native cultivars can be helpful in supporting the declining populations of both monarch butterflies and other insects. Not all plants that go by the common name of milkweed are the food that these butterflies need milkweed is both a food source and a host plant on which the monarch butterflies lay their eggs.
After hatching the larvae consume the. Monarchs lay their eggs on the underside of the milkweed foliage. As such milkweed is critical for the survival of monarchs.
By planting milkweed in your own garden landscape and throughout your community you can help reverse the fortune of these beautiful insects.
Monarch caterpillars feed exclusively on the leaves of milkweed the only host plant for this iconic butterfly species. Without it they cannot complete their life cycle and their populations decline. For the last two decades gardeners and butterfly enthusiasts have been trying to grow native milkweed to help monarch butterflies which lay their eggs exclusively on the plant and depend on it. 10 best books to survive food shortages famines.