Bee Balm Attracts Hummingbirds and Butterflies

If you would enjoy having constant summer visitation from hummingbirds and butterflies to your flower garden, then fragrant bee balm is the one must-have plant. Bee balm is an easy to grow, fragrant, edible, perennial flowering herb that will attract hummingbirds and butterflies from late spring until early fall.

How to Plant Bee Balm

Bee balm is one of those magnificent plants that thrives where other flowers won’t, like in low lying, poor soil. Start bee balm for seeds sown directly into the flower garden soil after all danger of frost has passed in the early spring, or start with small bee balm plants and plant them in garden soil 18 inches apart.

Bee balm requires at least six hours of sun daily, but prefers shade from the hot afternoon summer sun. The plant is not drought tolerant and requires plenty of moisture. When planted in the right location, bee balm will return year after year to attract hummingbirds and butterflies with its spicy orange fragrance. The plant will spread rapidly via its underground root system and will quickly fill in a flower bed or problem area in your landscape.

Mature Height and Bloom

Bee balm will reach a mature height of 3-4 feet, producing large, shaggy-looking blooms that are filled with fragrance. In a grouping of mature plants in full bloom, it will give the dazzling appearance of one large mass of blooms. Bloom colors range from deep reds, coral, purple, pink and white. The entire plant is fragrant from roots to blooms; running your hand over the plant will release a spicy orange fragrance into the air.

Bee balm is also called Oswego Tea. It’s a member of the mint family, and is an edible herb often used to make tea.

How to Care for This Hummingbird and Butterfly Magnet

Because bee balm does spread rapidly, it is subject to over-crowding, limiting its air circulation capacity, so thinning the bee balm plants out every few years will be needed. The moisture the plant requires also makes it vulnerable to leaf mold, keeping the plants thinned out will help prevent this from occurring.

Keeping the garden soil bee balm is planted in moist during the growing season and keeping the mature plants thinned out is the only care requirements this flower has.

If you want more hummingbirds and butterflies to visit, plant bee balm. Even if you don’t, bee balm is a beautiful and fragrant addition to any flower garden.