How to Build a Successful Monarch Habitat in the California Desert

Creating a monarch habitat is about much more than planting milkweed. A successful habitat provides everything monarchs need throughout their life cycle: host plants for caterpillars, nectar for adults, shelter from the elements, places to roost, and a healthy ecosystem that supports many other forms of wildlife. By thinking beyond a single plant, you can create a garden that benefits monarchs while enriching your entire landscape.

Habitat Essentials

☀️ Sunny location

Choose a sunny site for your garden
Monarchs rely on the sun's warmth to become active. Cooler temperatures can reduce adult activity and breeding and slow caterpillar growth and development. Since monarchs are present in the Coachella Valley during the cooler months, a sunny location helps provide the warmth they need.

A monarch's Goldilocks temperature is around 84°F: not too hot, not too cold, but right in their optimal range.

🌿 Native milkweed

Use only native milkweed

Plant milkweed species native to your region. Milkweed is the host plant monarch caterpillars depend on for food and development.

🌸 Native nectar plants

Include a diverse array of native nectar plants, including wildflowers, perennials, and shrubs that bloom during monarch season. Clumps of flowering plants will attract more pollinators than single plants scattered throughout the garden.

🌳 Roosting trees

A tree that has at least one side that is southeast or east-facing, so it has good sun in the morning. This allows the butterflies a place to roost at night and warm up in the morning sun.

🌬 Wind protection

Include windbreaks.

A fence, shrub, or wall can provide shelter and may also provide protected places for pupation.

💧 Water & puddling

Butterflies need water too. Many species obtain water, salts, and other minerals from damp soil through a behavior called puddling. Monarchs have also been observed puddling, although recent research suggests their use of sodium may differ from that of other butterfly species. There is still much we don't know.

A small area of damp, bare soil provides another resource for the many butterflies that may visit your habitat.

For more ways to attract butterflies and other pollinators, visit our Pollinator Garden page. →

Native milkweed
Milkweed is the only host plant for monarch caterpillars. Plant milkweed species native to your region, and whenever possible plant several rather than a single isolated plant.

Nectar plants
Adult monarchs need nectar throughout the time they are in the desert. Milkweed alone isn't enough. Include a variety of native flowering plants so something is blooming throughout monarch season.

Plant diversity
A monarch garden shouldn't be a milkweed bed. Trees, shrubs, perennials and annual wildflowers create shelter, nectar, places to roost and a more complete habitat.

Bloom through the seasons
Choose plants with overlapping bloom periods rather than relying on one big flush of flowers. In the low desert, that means thinking particularly about fall, winter and spring, when monarchs are present.

Planting for Monarchs

Did You Know?

Milkweed butterflies, the group that includes monarchs and queens, seek out plants containing pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs). These compounds can provide chemical protection, but monarchs and queens use them differently.

Both male and female monarchs acquire PAs, although researchers are still working to understand their full role in monarch health and biology.

Queens have a much stronger reproductive relationship with PAs. Male queens use PA-derived compounds in their courtship pheromone and transfer PAs to females during mating. Females can then pass them to their eggs.

Plants that provide PAs add another layer of diversity to a monarch habitat while also supporting our year-round queen butterflies.

There is still much research is teaching us about these fascinating plant-butterfly relationships.

I Have Milkweed. Where Are My Caterpillars?

Planting milkweed doesn't guarantee that caterpillars will immediately appear. A female monarch chooses where to lay her eggs carefully, and caterpillars don't necessarily stay on the plant where they hatched.

Females are selective. Monarchs use chemical receptors on their feet to identify milkweed and assess potential egg-laying sites. They generally lay eggs individually and often favor tender new growth.
More milkweed gives them more choices. Plant several native milkweeds together rather than relying on a single plant. This also gives growing caterpillars additional food as they move between plants.
Caterpillars move. Finding an egg or caterpillar one day and not finding it the next doesn't necessarily mean something happened to it. Caterpillars may leave a plant to molt, seek shelter, find fresh milkweed, or eventually pupate.
Look beyond the milkweed. Caterpillars don't necessarily form a chrysalis on their host plant. They may travel up to 30 feet before pupating, so check nearby shrubs, walls, pots, furniture, and other protected surfaces..
Create habitat for the adults, too. Nectar plants, shelter, sunny areas and protection from wind help make the entire garden attractive to monarchs, not just the milkweed.

Caring for your Habitat

Pesticides

Do not use insecticides in your monarch habitat.

Pesticides include insecticides, herbicides, fungicides, and other products used to control unwanted organisms. Even products labeled natural or organic can harm monarchs and other beneficial insects. A healthy, diverse habitat supports native predators that can help manage pest populations naturally.

Be especially cautious with systemic insecticides such as neonicotinoids. These chemicals are absorbed by plants and can remain in the leaves, nectar, and pollen, exposing caterpillars and adult butterflies as they feed. Plants may also have been treated before you purchase them, so ask your nursery about pesticide use.

If you need to use a pesticide elsewhere on your property, including an organic product, carefully read and follow the label instructions and avoid drift into your monarch habitat.

Learn more about pesticides and other Threats to Monarchs →

Where NOT to Plant Milkweed

Western monarchs journey to coastal California primarily to overwinter, not to reproduce.

Historically, milkweed was largely absent from these coastal overwintering areas. Because winters along the coast are mild, even native California milkweeds planted near the ocean may remain green through winter. When milkweed is available, monarchs may continue to mate and lay eggs rather than remaining in their normal overwintering state. Persistent milkweed can also increase the risk of disease, including OE.

For this reason, the Xerces Society recommends avoiding milkweed planting within 5 miles of the coast from Mendocino County through Santa Barbara County and within 1 mile of the coast south of Santa Barbara County. Instead, plant native nectar plants that bloom in fall, winter, and spring to provide food for overwintering monarchs.

Milkweed is also naturally absent from the immediate Oregon coast and from western Washington, where Washington's native milkweeds occur east of the Cascade Range. In these areas, planting locally native nectar plants rather than introducing milkweed better reflects the natural plant community.

Monarch Plant Community for the
California Low Desert

A community is a group of plants that naturally grow together to form a habitat. In this community, you will find native milkweed, the caterpillar host plant, trees for the butterflies to roost in, shrubs for both nectar sources and windbreaks; and annual and perennial nectar resources.