Where to put a butterfly border in the front garden

[okthenwhat]

I'm dreaming about turning over the front garden of our new house to wildlife gardening. The house is on a 1970s housing estate. Not massively busy in terms of traffic or footfall. Hopefully my neighbours won't hate me 😬

It's got a rockery border, a bit of lawn that won't get used much and to the side a rowan tree and more shady borde/lawn about a metre wide and two metres long. The whole front garden is maybe 5mx3m.

I plan to plant English bluebells and primroses and a woodland wildflower mix (has things like cowslip, campion) under the tree. I'm not sure if I'll need to cut the wildflowers down once a year in September/October (hopefully creating a bit of a sanctuary strip) so it's nice and clear for the primroses and bluebells in the spring. Is this the right thing to do or should I leave it be and let the wildflowers die back naturally in the autumn? I don't want to kill off the wildflowers nor the spring plants.

I want to turn the rockery over to more butterfly and bee friendly plants. The rockery is right at the front and no wall between it and the footpath. Will the butterflies dislike the placement? In my current house I have a lavender hedge right next to a not busy path in a similar housing estate with a bit of car and foot trafffic and the bees don't mind but I wonder if butterflies are a bit more delicate and would like it to be more sheltered? In that case I'll move that border to the back against the house.

The lawn is going to be no-mowed. I plan to mow it in March/April, July and September/October and see what seeds itself there. I might mow an edge around it to keep it neat. In the middle we're going to put bird feeders as our front room looks directly on to it.

I don't think the butterflies will mind! Have you thought about planting a buddleia? They will love that and you can get dwarf varieties and also ones that don't spread everywhere. Mint family plants going down well in my garden this year too.

@tinselvestsparklepants I am literally looking at dwarf budleias! Great minds eh? We've got a piece of fence at the side between us and the neighbour. So, I'll either put a full-size one in front of that or a dwarf on in the butterfly border (or both).

The butterflies will want sun but otherwise won't mind. If you're going no-mow with the grass you make also get speckled wood and meadow brown arriving.

There's not a lot growing in shade later in the year, the point about woodland flowers is they make use of the light tree cover in the spring. No need to cut down, they'll die down naturally. I'd go for Red Campion, Yellow Archangel, Greater Stitchwort. Also Bugle, Dog Violet or Early Dog Violet.

Bluebells will die down of their own accord, primrose leaves will be around all year.

I don't get butterflies on my lavender, just lots of bumblebees and hoverflies. Scabious gets more butterflies. Lavender does get the very occasional humming bird hawk moth.

In terms of the front garden aspect the no mow lawn is going to be the thing you might get complaints about. They are hard to get looking good, especially on a small scale.

The number one thing you can do for wildlife is bring water into the garden. Would you consider a network of tiny ponds instead of the no mow lawn? I don't know the layout of your garden but I'm imagining a small square of lawn. You could have four mini ponds at each corner, a birdbath in the middle and connect it together with mini gravel paths. Plant low cover and add piles of deadwood for creatures to hide in you would have a beautiful habitat.

You'd need to make sure bird food couldn't contaminate the water and the ponds aren't a hazard to the public (hence mini ponds as safer for all). You'd want it so not too many leaves fall in the ponds so not directly under the Rowan. You could put the bird feeders on your window maybe, so they stay in view?

@MereDintofPandiculation Thanks for the ideas!

Mint family is a great suggestion. My spearmint is alive with bees most years. Keep them in pots so they don't take over.

Oregano also massively popular with bees when it's in flower and would work well on your rockery. I've also got a flowering deadnettle the bumblebees love. Poached egg plants and alyssum are great for hoverflies. As is calendula (and toadflax and ragwort wild flowers - be careful with ragwort as it's poisonous to horses and many people don't like to see it growing for that reason)

Pulmonaria for early spring and foxgloves later on - both really popular with bumblebees and good in damper areas.

You will need a very powerful mower if you are only intending to mow twice a year. The average small mower won’t cut down tall grass and the very tough weeds which will spring up if you just leave it to its own devices. You could probably do it it with a proper strimmer ( not a lawn edger) . Please wear long sleeved shirts and trousers, and a face mask when you cut it, not all the insects who live in long grass are benign. The cut parts of several weeds, sorry, wildflowers are irritant and can cause serious inflammation.

Buddleia, sedum , asters , in fact most of the compositae( daisy family) give good nectar for bees and butterflies.

Grow ivy up your walls or fences for the holly blue butterfly and nasturtiums for cabbage whites

@deplorabelle Thanks for the ideas. The front garden is the bit you walk past to the front door and we have a back garden where the kids will play. We have a toddler and one on the way but I don't see how a few shallow, small ponds would be a massive risk to them or anyone else.

You will need to pre-cut, but this doesn't need to be with a strimmer. It can be done with a scythe or, for a small area which this is, garden shears. There is no reason to expect "very tough weeds" to spring up if the grass is cut twice a year. It takes time to develop that degree of toughness.

The most important thing is to remove the cuttings to reduce the fertility of the soil - grass is better able to take advantage of high nutrient levels.

You could always grow some wild flowers from seeds in pots,or hanging baskets, that's what l do, then you have a succession of plants, red campion is very good and self seeds.
The post about introducing water is a good idea, l think water gets very overlooked and vital especially during dry spells, l can't have bird baths, ponds, as l have cats and they chase the birds and frogs. But l do have some small water catchers on long stakes that l got from Etsy and the insects use them.
I grow a lot of poppies, foxgloves,, , tall verbena B.and single flower dahlias. They attract a lot of bees, butterflies. The ladybirds are my pets control, l don't use any chemicals.

Pest control

We have a meadow lawn n oir front gatden and it gets a strim and mow in late October when everything has set seed and the goldfinches have had a good feast, then 1 or 2 mows before the end of the year so the grass is short for the spring bulbs. Apart from that we don't touch it.

It's not going to win any awards for appearance, but it's covered in many species of bees and hoverflies for at least 9 months of the year (border planting fills the winter gap), we have multitudes of unimpressive but ecologically useful small moths in the grass and some bigger butterflies, a chorus of grasshoppers when the sun comes out, explosions of finches in autumn, and it's spontaneously started growing orchids.