#30DaysWild: Planting a Butterfly Garden

Day 2 of #30DaysWild took me to a primary school in Wincanton, Somerset. I am very lucky to work as an Education Officer for Butterfly Conservation on a Project called "Munching Caterpillars", which visits schools and events all across Dorset and Somerset. The Project itself is primarily funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund and aims to provide children with free, fun and interactive workshops all about butterflies, moths and caterpillars. It's a great project, and a great job!

Today it was Our Lady of Mount Carmel Primary School's turn to take part in the workshops. Three classes got involved (Year 1, Year 3/4 and Year 6), each learning lots about butterflies, moths and caterpillars in the classroom before heading outside to help plant up their very own butterfly garden within their school grounds!

The children planted butterfly-friendly wild flower plug plants to help provide an important nectar source for hungry insects. Hopefully the plants will also attract more butterflies and moths to the school grounds so the children will have a better chance of spotting these beautiful creatures during break times.

The plants we planted today were:

Bird's Foot Trefoil - a good nectar source, but also the food plant of many caterpillars including the Six-spot burnet moth and Common blue butterfly.

Catmint - a lovely scented wildflower that produces lots of nectar.

Cornflower - a very pretty nectar plant that produces bright blue flowers.

PS Wildlife Gardening tip of the day: plant a variety of native wildflowers in your garden to keep butterflies hanging around for longer. Butterflies like there to be a mixture of nectar plants and caterpillar food plants.