Blue Vervain

Notes:

The cardinal, swamp sparrow, field sparrow, song sparrow, and slate-colored junco eat the seeds of blue vervain. The cottontail rabbit will sometimes eat the foliage; most other mammalian herbivores avoid it due its bitter taste. The caterpillars of the verbena moth feed on the leaves and it is the larval host for the common buckeye butterfly. Long and short tongued bees collect the nectar and sometimes the pollen. Other bee pollinators include: epoline cuckoo bees, eucerine miner bees , halictid bees, and the verbena bee, a specialist pollinator. In addition the thread-waisted wasp, bee flies, thick-headed flies and golden soldier beetle are also known to all visit blue vervain.