We're Over-Run!!

We have caterpillars everywhere! After what seems like a few months of no Monarchs our milkweed plants are now covered with them; we lost count somewhere over a dozen. We also have the Gulf Fritillaries which are now cocooning everywhere, including two under the iron garden chair by our front door.

I am so glad we started butterfly gardening; it is amazing to see nature in action.

Butterfly Mamas

Today the kids and I were enchanted by a Gulf Fritillary butterfly laying eggs on our passion vine. We were able to see the eggs! I thought they would be too small but they were clearly visible. She was laying those little guys everywhere both on and around the passion vine, which has sprouted all over our front planting bed. (I can't weed the run away sprouts now, darn it all.) We already have a ton of the orange caterpillars and I had to move several of them that were on non-passion vine plants. I didn't actually touch them even though the internet tells me they won't sting; they are scary looking! I either pulled the leaf they were on off the incorrect plants or used a piece of mulch to transport them to the passion vine. Another problem with that little mama butterfly is that she was laying eggs on little sprouts instead of the main vine, little sprouts that won't support a caterpillar for very long, let alone the massive numbers she was spreading around.

I can see "Caterpillar Mover" as a new entry on my resume...

Bug Pictures

Here are pictures of our caterpillars and our passion vine. Upon looking at them more closely, I think the orange caterpillars on the passion vine are Gulf Fritillaries after all, not Variegated Fritillaries. It's quite obvious when looking at the on-line pictures of the caterpillars; I just couldn't remember the exact coloring when I looked them up and I hadn't taken a picture yet.

The first picture below shows two of our Monarchs on a newly planted milkweed. Oooh, almost forgot- a neighbor spotted a Monarch chrysalis on one of our plants and we were able to bring it inside and put it in our Bugville Treehouse, where it can finish its metamorphosis free from predators. And maybe we'll get to watch it emerge from its cocoon if we're really lucky!!!



Here are two of the Gulf Fritallary caterpillars. You can barely see the second one; part of him is peeking out from behind a leaf. You can see a chewed up leaf in the foreground; these guys are HUNGRY!



Here is the passion vine; can you believe we just planted that thing a few months ago, and it was no more than two feet high when it went in the ground? We may be doing battle with that plant in the future 'cause I think it's trying to take over! It hasn't flowered yet, though; I'm looking forward to that since the Passion Flowers are lovely.