Butterfly Bush

Description:

Buddleja, or Buddleia but commonly known as the Butterfly Bush, is a genus of flowering plants. The generic name bestowed by Linnaeus posthumously honoured the Reverend Adam Buddle (1662–1715), a botanist and rector in Essex, England, at the suggestion of Dr William Houstoun. Houstoun sent the first plants to become known to science as buddleja (B. americana) to England from the Caribbean about 15 years after Buddle's death. Flower colour varies widely, with white, pink, red, purple, orange or yellow flowers produced by different species and cultivars; they are rich in nectar and often strongly scented. The fruit is a small capsule about 1 cm (0.39 in) long and 1–2 mm (0.039–0.079 in) diameter, containing numerous small seeds; in a few species (previously classified in the separate genus Nicodemia) the capsule is soft and fleshy, forming a berry. The genus Buddleja is now included in the figwort family, Scrophulariaceae; it had earlier been classified in either the Loganiaceae or in a family of its own, the Buddlejaceae.

Habitat:

The genus is endemic to four continents. Over 60 species are native throughout the warmer parts of the New World from the southern United States south to Chile, while many other species are found in the Old World, in Africa, and parts of Asia, but all are absent as natives from Europe and Australasia.