Butterfly Report

The Monarch caterpillars are eating us out of house and... milkweed! I was out running errands all day today and planned to stop by the home improvement center to get more but I was out of gas. (Personally, not the car. It's a fibro thing; I'm no energizer bunny.) Now that I've had a chance to sit for a little while and take some Tylenol I'm going to head out again, which is really hard. I'll do it for the cater-pooters (as The Eldest calls them) though! They are so cute. Today we found a hatchling on a milkweed that was totally bare so I moved it. It was so tiny! Just like the big guys only... mini. We also found a giganto caterpillar heading up on a tall plant next to the milkweed. We grabbed him and put him (or her) in our bugville treehouse and he's up at the top now getting ready to cocoon.

Those weren't the only caterpillars I moved today. I woke up early this morning (early for me, anyway) and went outside to take out a bag of trash before the garbage truck arrived. I walked over to check on our little buggies and realized quite a few of them were in danger of running out of leaves. So there I was in my nightgown moving caterpillars around... sheese.

Never a dull moment when you're a caterpillar mama!!

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.

Magic Moments

The two pupa (pupas? not sure of the plural) that we put in our Bugville Treehouse on Tuesday resulted in two Monarch butterflies today! When we have pupas (?) in there my habit is to check on them first thing in the morning... err, afternoon... as soon as I get up. According to the Monarch Watch website they usually hatch early in the day and sure enough, there they both were. They were pretty still to start out with, letting their wings dry I suppose, but then started fluttering around more later on. I decided on a 4:15 release time as that would allow us to invite some other kids from the neighborhood to see them go, plus it's right after The Middle Child's piano lesson. (The lovely and talented piano teacher also came out to see the release, btw.) This also gave them a good long time in the safety of the habitat to let their wings dry, which is an important consideration. I've seen pictures of butterflies with wing damage due to drying incorrectly and it is a sad thing, let me tell you. I was a little worried it would rain since it was a bit overcast (the website tells you not to release them in the rain) but the weather held. We let them go in the front yard since we have more flowers there but the flowers didn't seem to interest them. One landed on The Youngest, aka The Wild Child, for a brief moment before they took off. They flew up and off into the sky; they were lost to our sight in only a few moments. I think they were reveling in their ability to fly, personally! I mean, they are caterpillars before they go into their chrysalises (OK, I caved and looked it up- the plural of chrysalis is either chrysalises or chrysalides; the plural of pupa is pupae or pupas) then all of a sudden they emerge, and wa-la, they can FLY! I'd revel in it, wouldn't you?

Proud Parents of a Bouncing Baby... Butterfly!

Our monarch butterfly emerged today! We kept it caged for a few hours then let it go during The Middle Child's Brownie meeting, which was unbelievably good timing. (I should play the lottery now, see if the luck holds.) When it was still in the Bugville Treehouse we were able to watch as it dried its wings by slowly opening and closing them; the colors were so crisp and lovely. The girls were enthralled with the release which happened far too quickly. It was there, then it was gone. DH tried to get pictures but all he got was a blur. Not to worry, however, as we rounded up two more chrysalises and installed them safely in the Treehouse. (It keeps them safe from predators like spiders, who can penetrate the pupa and kill the butterfly before it even has a chance to form,or at least I think they can. We saw a spider on a chrysalis several weeks ago and it had us very worried. I found the directions for moving them on the Monarch Watch website.)

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.

More Butterflies!!!

We about gave up on our butterfly garden since our milkweed attracted aphids. We thought the monarchs would pass us right on by, and they did for a while, so we stopped checking for them. Nature keeps right on going, however, even when we aren't paying attention, and today we found a Monarch caterpillar crawling across our driveway! A quick glance over at our milkweed and we knew an emergency run to Home Depot was in order. When we got back with the milkweed plants and started messing around in our garden areas The Middle Child found Monarchs all over the place! We rounded them up and put as many as we could find on the plants. Now, we're not supposed to do that under normal circumstances, because when a Monarch caterpillar leaves its milkweed plant it is looking for a place to make a chrysalis. We figured that since the plants were totally stripped of leaves they were probably looking for FOOD more than a place to cocoon, and indeed a couple of them started munching away.

THEN The Middle Child took a look at our passion vine and found caterpillars there, too, only a NEW kind of caterpillar, definitely not a Monarch. She started counting them and easily found 10. Good thing the passion vine has gone bananas where we planted it, even with my neglectful not-very-green thumb. I googled "passion vine caterpillar" and I think our caterpillars are Variegated Fritillaries but I wouldn't swear to it. They look all scary and stingy but one article I read says the "stingers" are soft and you can pick them up. I'll pass, thanks.

We're Certified!

Our little butterfly garden is going to be certified as an official Monarch Waystation! I found a website tonight called "Monarch Watch" and poked around, only to find out that they have a certification program. They need as many people as possible to plant milkweed and other nectar plants for the Monarchs since they are losing so much of their natural habitat. Butterflies are yet another casualty of modern farming practices; sigh. The evil corporations that brought us genetically engineered crops made it possible for farmers to use Round Up as much as they want; it won't kill the corn or whatever the farm is growing. What it does kill is milkweed. Get the connection? No milkweed, no Monarch butterflies. Well, all in the name of profits, right?

Anyway, the website explains it better than I can given I'm coming down with a cold and my brain is foggy anyway, so go check it out for yourself. Remember anything underlined is CLICKABLE and will lead you to something interesting!

Caterpillars!

We have caterpillars on our milkweed, and LOTS of them! The Middle Child counted 15 of them yesterday all in various sizes. We can't wait to see our first chrysalis. You can see two of them in the first picture and one in the second hanging from the back of a leaf, where we find them most often. They are just like The Very Hungry Caterpillar (except they only eat milkweed).

Of Butterflies and Milkweed

We have caterpillars on our milkweed! Well, on the new milkweed we purchased at the garden center today, anyway. We bought 5 new plants and the check out guy found two little teeny caterpillars already on one of the plants. The kids were tickled pink! We were so motivated we got the plants in the ground within a few hours of getting them home, and that's a first. (They usually have to languish for several days, umm, weeks until we get around to planting them, if they survive. Those plants have to go through plant boot camp to go in the ground around our house!) We also saw a monarch fluttering around the milkweed we already had a few days ago so maybe we'll get caterpillars on those plants, too. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

Gardening

I get very envious when I see other blogs that talk about their lovely vegetable gardens. I don't have a green thumb, and even if I did our homeowner's association strictly forbids growing plants of an edible nature. (Shh, don't tell them about the basil and oregano I have growing... sort of... in the backyard!) I do believe it's important for kids to get out in the dirt, though, so even though we've got several strikes against us, I keep trying to get the kids involved in garden projects. Although I think growing food is more fun for kids, we've developed an interest in growing edible plants for some non-human types, namely butterflies. Our interest was sparked after a visit to a butterfly garden with The Middle Child's Brownie troop. They told us how easy it is to attract butterflies if you put out the right plants. Several trips to the local garden center later, we're in business. So far no butterflies, though. We can, however, count sore thighs (mine) and lots of mosquito bites. (Mine and The Middle Child's.)

Here's how everything turned out in our little butterfly garden:



PS: The kids were so excited when we saw a monarch butterfly on our half dead milkweed today!! (July 14th) The milkweed is across the yard from the flower garden so it's close by, but not pictured. The 5 plants have been sitting out in the planting bed in the pots we bought them in but we got them in the ground and watered them pretty quickly after that so most of them perked up a little. I have room for 5 more plants so it's time to head to the garden center again; if we get caterpillars we need more food for them!