The catmints tend to be excellent nectar flowers - Nepeta x faassenii 'Six Hills Giant' being perhaps the most commonly grown out there, which can heave with bees.
So I was pleased while hunting around a garden centre at the weekend to see yet another cultivar 'doing the business' on the bee front - and with a butterfly indulging too.
The plant is Nepeta 'Walkers Low', which some people list as another x faassenii cultivar, while others call it a cultivar of Nepeta racemosa, originally a wild plant from the Caucasus. The RHS go with the latter, so I won't argue!
It grows to maybe 60cm (2 foot) tall, forming a good clump of rather greyish leaves with neatly serrated edges, and then sprouting numerous upright stems decked with, for catmints, quite large flowers, big-lipped and mauve.
Here (left) is my Small White butterfly and bumble playing good neighbours.
I normally avoid catmints like the plague, not because I don't like them (I love them) but because the local cats like them even more than I do and will trash them within days. Now I have read that cats are not so keen on Walkers Low, but at £6.99 it was too expensive as an experiment. But if you have catmint experiences you'd like to share - good or bad - you know what to do: add a comment!
If you want to drop by my RSPB wildlife gardening blog, it is updated every Friday, and I'd love to see you there - www.rspb.org.uk/community/blogs/hfw
I also have Six Hills Giant and it lives up to it's name. Flowering all summer long, the pretty mauve-blue flowers attract plenty of bees and other insects. My cat likes to sit chewing the leaves or rolling in it but has never caused any obvious damage and neighbouring cats don't seem to be attracted to it. I have several plants together in a clump so if any die, which they do if you let them get too large and woody, I always have more to replace them. Its a great plant to encourage insects which will then help to pollinate your vegetables!