This is the front of Fountain Crest on Taylor Lane Extension showing the main entrance.

Several residents of Fountain Crest, a Lehigh Acres retirement community that many are calling a “resort in Lehigh,” looked on as several butterflies fluttered their wings and landed on this plant and then another.

It was during a short dedication ceremony outside in the back of the retirement community at 1230 Taylor Lane Extension, just off of Homestead Rd. Residents looked on as Earla Miller thanked those who in the past two months have created a beautiful luscious butterfly garden. Miller, who makes her home at Fountain Crest, is president of the Resident Council.

Seniors were sitting on a large patio in the shade overlooking the new butterfly garden as Miller thanked several for helping to make it all possible.

Denise Stuckey, Fountain Crest’s marketing director, says she would love to show anyone in the community the new butterfly garden and the interior of Fountain Crest.

Some of the residents go outside after a meal and relax for a while watching butterflies flutter about.

Drew Maloney, owner of Elegant Landscape Services, left, and Brian Snider, the facility’s maintenance supervisor, worked together to prepare the butterfly garden.

One Monarch butterfly has already found the site and is calling it home. It fluttered and landed on several of the blooming plants while a photographer was trying to take its picture.

“There’s one over there,” said one of the residents. “Look how beautiful, they are.”

The new butterfly garden is located near the building off a very large outside patio in a quarter-acre back yard. The garden may measure 30 feet long and 20 feet or more wide and is in two parts, separated by a walkway.

Not only are butterflies welcomed there but so are birds that want to fly down and take a drink out of the bird’s bath in one end of the large butterfly garden.

To be sure the right plants were introduced into the butterfly garden, residents called on Drew Maloney, owner of Elegant Landscape Services in Lehigh Acres.

Residents Virginia Mehlfelt, left, and Earla Miller, inspect some of the plantings in Fountain Crest's new butterfly garden. Photos by Mel Toadvine

He selected the some 65 or more flowering plants and a couple of trees that bloom throughout the year.

“They draw the butterflies here to eat and lay their eggs,” Maloney said. He provided the labor at no cost to build the butterfly garden and was able to get the mirage of plants at wholesale cost or the residents council. The plants came from Riverland Nursery and have been planted throughout the garden with space between them.

Every plant was in bloom as the residents looked out over the garden during the ceremony.

In addition, they also built another much smaller patio on the other side of the butterfly garden and added a glider and several chairs so residents can walk out and sit close by as the butterflies fly around from plant to plant.

Special thanks were expressed by Earla Miller during the ceremony, pointing to residents Virginia Mehlfelt and Rudy Weily who water the garden. There are automatic sprinklers but Miller said the two give the garden that special touch to make everything pretty.

Debbie Whiteaker, Denise Stuckey and Sally Carman, look over a part of the butterfly garden at Fountain Crest, a community complex in Lehgh for those 50 and over.

Also helping to plant were resident Jim Dulany and two young men from the Mormon Church who are young male missionaries in Lehigh.

Miller said the garden was dedicated to Gordon Coon who lived at Fountain Crest before he passed away late last year, and also to her mother.

“Gordon loved flowers; he would be so happy to see this,” said resident Eva Lundstrom.

Maloney was glad to point out the plants in the garden suggesting to others in Lehigh that if they want to create such a garden to attract butterflies, these are the plants to look for.

Lantanta, Bush Daisy, Panama Rose, different varieties of Milkweeds, which is where the butterfly lays her eggs. Maloney said the larvae eat on the plant when they are born.

In addition, he planted Purple Duranta, and Cape Honeysuckle. In the middle of the garden is a Hong Kong Orchid tree with one bloom, with more expected soon.

“The butterflies will find your garden and if you keep it watered, they will come and spend time there every day,” Maloney said. The garden is bedded down with wooden shavings which offer a great contrast to the green plants and their blooming flowers.

The preparation for the garden began in early March.

“It’s a beautiful garden and they have about a thousand dollars in it, not bad,” Maloney said.

Brian Snider, the facility’s maintenance supervisor said for the seven years that he has been associated with Fountain Crest, he has found Maloney and his Elegant Landscape Services to be “the best landscaping crew he has worked with, bar none.”

The ceremony was coordinated by Debbie Whiteaker. Fountain Crest Executive Director Sally Carman was at the ceremony and said the project was a wonderful thing for all the residents of Fountain Crest.

“Everyone loves it and it is so beautiful, a great addition to our community. We are so proud of what our residents council did. We want to show off Fountain Crest to everyone in town and in other areas of the county,” said Marking Director Denise Stuckey.

“We have the best kept secret right here in Lehigh. We’re open to the public every day. We are more than happy to show them around and let them see all that we have here, the public areas and the rooms, the TV room and the large dining room.

Residents of Fountain Crest pay one fee to live in their apartment. It includes three meals a day (and food in between if they want), their cable and phone and their electricity and they even get free transportation to the doctor or to the store.

In addition to these services, Stuckey said each resident is given a life security pendant that they can wear around their neck or on their wrist in case of an emergency such as a fall when they can push it and summons help. It is a gift to the residents of Fountain Crest from the management, Stuckey said.

When you enter the front entrance, there are offices on either side. In front is a beautiful water fountain and off to the right is a large, dining room.

Outside is a large parking lot with shaded parking for a great number of automobiles.

“We just love to come to work here and we want the people to see what we have done with Fountain Crest. Our rates are so reasonable that people are surprised when they visit. They are provided everything here, anything they want,” she said.

“We know all of our residents by names. They are not numbers to us. We all are very close,” Stuckey said.