This week’s Buzz & Bloom is a perfect example of why choosing native plants can make such a difference for wildlife.
🌿 THE BLOOM: New Jersey Tea (Ceanothus americanus)
Clusters of tiny white flowers make this compact native shrub a busy summertime gathering place for bees, butterflies, and other beneficial insects. But its value doesn’t end when the flowers fade.
🦋 THE BUZZ: Mottled Duskywing (Erynnis martialis)
This small, mottled skipper has an important relationship with Ceanothus. New Jersey tea is one of its larval host plants—a place where females can lay their eggs and the emerging caterpillars have the food they need to grow.
That’s the difference between simply feeding a butterfly and helping create butterfly habitat.
Nectar plants provide energy for visiting adults. Host plants provide something equally important: a place for the next generation to begin.
💚 The connection:
New Jersey Tea → Caterpillar → Mottled Duskywing
When we plant natives, we’re not just adding flowers to our landscapes. We’re rebuilding relationships between plants and wildlife that have developed over thousands of years.
🌱 Plant the bloom. Support the buzz. Build the habitat.
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