Click below to listen to my 2 min. Garden Bite radio show: Pollinator plants and hummingbird attractors
Planting to attract all kinds of pollinators and hummingbirds too! I have native plants scattered all over my landscape, in particular my butterfly garden and rain garden.
But – I also enjoy new cultivars, so don’t be afraid to plant them. The one thing we have to understand is that there is almost always a trade-off of some sort. Maybe that rose color is spectacular, but it has lost some of its fragrance. Or perhaps you get a disease resistant tomato that lacks that full flavor of an heirloom.
That said, there are still some great choices to attract bees, butterflies and hummingbirds to your garden with natives and non-natives alike.
One native that pollinators love is Purple Prairie Clover as well as Butterfly weed and Asters.
For hummingbirds, they love the color red. Petunias and fuchsias are high on the list. So is salvia.
Hummers really like tubular shaped flowers. For another annual consider cuphea. Cardinal flowers are gorgeous in the raingarden. They like their soil damp.
Columbine, in particular the Native yellow and red, Aquilegia canadensis, will also attract those little jewels to the garden. They handle full sun to shade and sandy/loam soils. And they’re deer resistant!
This is a more comprehensive list of pollinator friendly plants: Of Plants and Pollinators – Teri Knight (1)