I live in Everett, WA and with a new (to me) garden I want to attract humming birds and butterflies. A neighbor told me she lived in area for over 39 years and has never seen hummingbirds around. I saw a map where the Annie was seen in Edmonds, WA about 10 miles south from me. Am I being too optimistic to think that a humming bird or two could come to my yard?
I hope you do get a visit from hummingbirds. I read about a beautiful blue flower plant "Brazilian Blue Flower" that attracts hummingbirds. It takes full sun and grows quickly, into large shrub. The tiny blue flowers actually smell a little like bubble gum. It not only attracts hummingbirds, but also lots of bumble bees. This plant is easy to take care of, grows fast and doesn't seem to attract any bad bugs or pests!
I am not familiar with your area, but here's some links to get you started. http://search.nwf.org/search?q=hummingb ... xml_no_dtd Local Native plant societies should be able to tell you the best plants for your area. http://www.plantnative.com/cs_watowy.htm#ev http://74.125.95.132/search?q=cache:77g ... clnk&gl=us Be sure to include Host plants for your butterflys, (such as milkweeds, dill, fennel,violets) as well as the necter plants.
I live out in Aberdeen, way out near the coast and if you plant the right flowers you will be dodging the hummingbirds, litteraly. I went to a friends mom's house and the flowers she had out there were visited by no less than 10-30 humingbirds at any given time. They would dive bombs us, buzz around our heads and did not even care we were there if we didn't make any sudden movements. There are a lot of hummingbirds in the state and some very beautiful ones along with some duller ones. I will let you know what the flower is once I remember what it was or see it again. I saw it at Wal Mart and home Depot in the last 2 weeks so I need to go back and find them again. All I can tell you right now is it has red flowers that are spaced out somewhat with 20-40 per stem and 4-6 feet tall. Acording to my friends mom they also spread like a weed. I believe the one she has is Crocosmia. As for butterflies, butterfly weed seems a good choice as well as bee balm. I have not seen a lot of butterflies on this side of the state so this will be new to me if they come to my flowers also.
