Recently in butterflies and caterpillars Category

It seems strange to post pictures of a bright sunny day while I listen to the lovely sounds of raindrops falling outside. But at least I'm dry.

Over the past couple of days, the garden was a green version of Grand Central Station. Butterflies, wasps, moths, flies, and other creatures all came to feast, rest, and feast some more. It was high noon when I took these, unfortunately, but beggars can't be choosers when there are masses of creatures about all at the same time! You just get the shots when you can.

At last, Painted Lady butterflies have come to visit.

I love the hidden peacock feathers you see in their hindwings.

  Variegated Fritillaries have arrived, too.

    A Snout Butterfly rested on Big Muhly.

And Queens went back and forth between the Gregg's Mistflower...

and the Milkweed.

I have so many kinds of skippers I can't name them all.

I think this is a Fiery Skipper...

and this a White-Checkered Skipper.

The Gulf Fritillary was a challenge to photograph -- it cared not for sitting still.

And Sulphurs -- some big, some small. Is this a Southern Dogface Sulphur or a Cloudless Sulphur?

Tiny yellow butterflies fluttered about -- they didn't sit still for long. Hmmm... Little Yellow or Mimosa?

The big butterfly attractors have been the milkweed, zinnias, and Gregg's Mistflower, but a few days ago I set out a banana for the butterflies. They do love a rotting banana, but the last time I did that, the banana just rotted all by its little lonesome. This time, I walked out to discover a Goatweed Leaf Butterfly enjoying a snack with a Snout Butterfly (and a fly).

So I decided to set out a fresher banana, as well, and -- whoa -- incoming. Suddenly my new banana became an experiment and a wildlife study. The first visitors were wasps and flies. I'm not even going to attempt to identify any of these, but there's quite the variety!

The wasps didn't always get along. The big red hornet-like one was the bully you'd expect him to be -- not that the other wasps were friendly and gentle-like, mind you...

While the wasps were distracted with their quarreling, the flies zoomed in for some banana. I like how they naturally spread themselves out.

Do you see the beautiful metallic turquoise insect in the lower left corner? That's a Cuckoo Wasp -- the only one I can identify other than "fly" or "wasp."

  Here's another pic.

I didn't mind all the visiting wasps. It kept them distracted from my Queen caterpillars on the milkweed.

And the flies and wasps weren't the only visitors to the bananas. Snouts began to venture over to the fresher banana, and today I found my first Red Admiral. What a beauty!

See this "pretty" yellow, green, and black bug? Bad bug. Spotted cucumber beetle. You can mourn it if you like -- it and four of its friends. At least I found them on the banana and not in my veggie garden. That water in the pic is from today's rain.

The only butterfly picture I didn't capture that first picture day was the lone Monarch I saw flying around. Have they started to move on? I'm keeping my eye out for caterpillars -- I did see a female Monarch laying eggs on the milkweed several days ago.

Elsewhere in the garden today, I discovered what I think is an assassin bug nymph. My last one was red, though, so I don't know.

And off in the former pumpkin patch, where a few pumpkins and vines await me doing something about them, I found an icky green guy having a feast.

Enjoy it while you can, buddy.  

Who nose why they have this name? Yeah, ok, that joke really smells. 'Snot my best.

But I have to say, the snout butterfly is pretty cool. Its elongated palpi in front of its eyes give it the appearance of having a long nose.

Easily camouflaged on tree branches and dead leaves, one might not even notice it.

Until it opens it's wings, that is -- hello!

I'd never seen one until this year, and now they are all over my garden. It's possible they've been visiting for years, as we have numerous hackberries in the area and in my yard -- the trees are the larval host of snout butterflies. But I'd been eagerly keeping an eye out this year, and suddenly the snouts are plentiful. Supposedly it has something to do with drought and rain -- with the right conditions, the population can be enormous, and then these cute little butterflies might fly en masse, like a cloud in the sky. Now that's another sight I'd like to see!

It started out like any other afternoon. I went out to garden and got distracted immediately by butterflies flutterbying. Then I noticed two Queen butterflies doing their thing on the fence by the veggie garden, and as I just couldn't miss the photo opportunity, I ran to get the camera. Just in case you are interested, the male is at the fence's edge, and the female is upside-down.

But what I really want to draw your attention to is the sneaky little voyeur nicely camouflaged in the lower right corner. I didn't notice it until the Queens flew away.

And suddenly I forgot all about those pretty butterflies, and I was in love. Sorry, hubby.

Isn't she CUTE? Here she is again, turned for your viewing pleasure.

She has interesting markings on her back. She's some species of Phidippus, but I couldn't find a similar spider online with those kinds of markings. So for now, she's "Phidippus Meredith."

Would she have attacked the butterflies if they hadn't flown off? Did they fly off because of me (probably) or the spider? I guess we'll just never know!

After a bit I pulled my two plain blue eyes away from her eight gorgeous hypnotic black eyes and went to check on the veggies, where I found this monster chewing away. NOT cute.

My son came outside then, so I rushed to show him the spider. And look what she had caught! Smart girl! What is that?

Look, now she's giving it a hug!

She loves it!

Not too far away, I found another jumping spider (and I was ecstatic, of course). This one is Phidippus mystaceus, also CUTE. How can you resist her? She's so furry and lovable. Her eight eyes give her remarkable vision. Quite the tracker. Little flies would land near her, and she would turn her body instantaneously to watch them.

Bye, little spider! I love you!

The garden is just magical -- as soon as I walk outside, I see dozens of butterflies fluttering about, and I'm literally mesmerized for some time. And finally, the male Monarchs have started to join the females. So I get to add a new picture to my Butterfly ID page, which shows easy ways to distinguish Queens, Monarchs, Soldiers, and Viceroys. Here's the image I'm adding in -- see the updated page for the whole set of photos.

As a special treat on Halloween, other recent Habitat Steward graduates and I had the honor of visiting the award-winning and very beautiful wildlife habitat of Dale and Pat Bulla here in Austin. 

I had heard a lot about their spectacular wildscape, so when our Habitat Steward group was given the opportunity to have a tour, you know I jumped at the chance!

Dale (left) and Pat (center) are also both Habitat Stewards with NWF, and preserving native Texas plant life is exceptionally important to them. They are leaders in conservation efforts in Austin and Texas, and they were a primary force in helping their neighborhood win Austin's Community Wildlife Habitat challenge in 2008 with the highest number of certified wildlife habitats.

Pat and Dale have lived on their property since 1998, building their home on a rocky limestone slope overlooking the Balcones Canyonland Preserves. Their efforts to create a natural landscape since then have paid off -- paths of natural materials such as mulch, rock, and cedar lead visitors through peaceful woods and past pocket seeps.

Many of the plants were placed there by the Bullas, but many more were delivered by birds and other creatures. The result is a wonderland of native Texas species.

Pat told me that the plants on their property are about 95% native, with the remaining being well adapted plants such as rosemary and winter-blooming germander.

It being the end of October, we were able to see many species just beginning their fall fruit or fall color stages.

As we toured the Bulla wildscape, Dale and Pat identified many of their favorite trees, shrubs, and perennials, sometimes sharing stories about certain plants. We tasted the leaves of a Toothache Tree (Zanthoxylum hirsutum), and after a couple of minutes I felt my gums tingle, as if they were going numb. I want one of these trees for the pure fun of it.

The Bullas are fortunate to have many rare or unusual plants, such as the Lindheimer's Crown-Beard (Verbesina lindheimeri), a plant so rare and special that the Wildflower Center collected seeds from the Bulla plants and sent them to the Millennium Seed Bank in London. Other plants, not necessarily considered rare, can still quite difficult to find in nurseries. 

The Bullas study the soil, light, and water conditions of their property in order to best place plants. With a combination of rocky slopes, natural seeps, sun, shade, woods, and open areas all on their property, it seemed to me that they had an advantage in being able to plant a little bit of everything!

Bluebonnet seedlings, Tropical Sage, Little Bluestem, and other plants were interspersed in the Buffalo grass of the Bullas' front yard mini-prairie.

Amazingly, the habitat is home to six different kinds of native Texas passionflower vines.

The Bullas have a knack for creating functional habitat features that blend in with the natural setting, including a manmade seep-like water source, beebox (with nesting holes for solitary bees), and rock man.

Dale and Pat's home serves as an example to others about how to minimize their carbon footprint. Not only is their carbon footprint exceptionally low due to natural paths, water collection systems, zero lawn, and minimal water usage, the Bullas also use solar panels that produce enough electricity to actually return some back to the city.

And of course, the wildlife love the Bullas' habitat, too. Unfortunately for the Bullas, however, this includes destructive feral hogs that visit the property from the BCP during the night, occasionally tearing up pathways and plants while looking for grubs, roots, and tasty vegetation. Deer prevent Dale and Pat from planting certain delectable species and veggies, too. But birds, butterflies, lizards, and other creatures call the Bullas' habitat home. We enjoyed watching the Queens and Monarchs fluttering about, but I was truly mesmerized by this Buckeye. I have yet to see a Buckeye in my yard!

It's no wonder the Bullas' habitat is designated as a Green Garden by the City of Austin. An award well deserved!

The butterflies this fall have been utterly delightful. The number of species visiting our garden have been hard to count, but it's been fun trying. Monarchs, Skippers, Sulphurs, Swallowtails, big, little, striking, camouflaged -- you name it, we seem to have it. The Monarchs, always a happy presence, keep skipping off when I bring out the camera, usually because the dogs like to visit the garden when I do. But without a doubt this year the Queen butterflies have put on the biggest show, fluttering about, dancing with each other, visiting all the flowers in the garden, taking a rest, then going at it again.

Queens, Monarchs, Viceroys, Soldiers -- these butterflies are very often mistaken for one another in the United States, so how does one tell them apart? The fact that they often follow similar regional migration paths certainly doesn't help.

The Queen butterfly (Danaus eresimus) and its lookalike cousins, the Monarch (Danaus plexippus) and the Soldier (Danaus eresimus) butterflies, are all from the same genus. They enjoy the same larval food, the poisonous Milkweed, which in turn makes all the butterflies unpleasant to predators, and their resemblance to one another helps protect all of them. The fourth lookalike is the Viceroy butterfly (Limenitis archippus), from a different genus. At a quick glance, to me, Soldiers and Queens look very much alike, and Monarchs and Viceroys are most similar to each other. But fortunately there are easy ways to distinguish them all.

But first, butterfly terms. It's important to know these when identifying or describing features on a butterfly. The four areas typically described are upperside, seen when the wings are opened; underside, or "side view" when the wings are upright; forewings (upper pair); and hindwings (lower pair).

  So let's take a closer look at the Queen butterfly. From the underside, the most noticeable marker is the lack of black veins in the forewing; the Queen's are pale. The Queen also does not have a series of pale spots along the hindwing found in the similar Soldier butterfly (shown in link farther in post). 

The upperside is also distinctive for the Queen, with its chestnut color and noticeable lack of black veins found in the other species.

Note in the above two photos that one is a female butterfly and the other is a male. The male Queen butterfly, as in many butterflies, has two scent patches called androconial scales, which distribute the pheromones it uses to attract the females. Here is an underside view of a male Queen.

The familiar Monarch butterfly is typically larger and more orange than the Queen butterfly.

The upperside of a Monarch shows a wide black band along the edge of the forewing. The bold black veins on this Monarch indicate that it is a female; male monarchs have thinner black veins, along with their androconial spots. Monarchs lack a secondary black arc found on the hindwings of Viceroys.

  Soldier butterflies are fairly similar to Queens at first glance, but they have black veins on the underside of the forewing and pale spots visible on the underside of the hindwing. The veins of the upperside are also more defined on a Soldier butterfly than on a Queen. Their distribution range is more limited than that of the Queen, typically farther south into Mexico. 

And finally, the Viceroy. The Viceroy butterfly (Limenitis archippus) is not a member of the same genus as the Monarch, Queen, and Soldier butterflies, but it looks remarkably like them, particular Monarchs. If you click on the link, you'll see in the picture there that the primary distinguishing mark of a Viceroy is a secondary black line arching through the hindwing on both the upperside and the underside -- as mentioned above, Monarchs do not have this.

The Viceroy is an example of Müllerian mimicry because its orange and black markings are like that of whichever Danaus species is local to its area, and all are unpalatable. In this way the four species having similar markings and a bad taste provide them all with added protection from would-be predators. 

Did you know that there are other butterflies with similar markings, including one called the Common Tiger in India? It's a beauty -- in addition to the orange and black coloring of Monarchs, the Common Tiger has beautiful white stripes on the forewings. Others are found in Africa and elsewhere in Asia. The animal kingdom sure is fascinating.  

Yesterday, my boys and I did a whirlwind tour of the beautiful yards of this year's Inside Austin Gardens Tour. There was something special about each and every home, and we thank the homeowners for opening their yards to the community. Each yard was a certified wildlife habitat, and we even got to see some wildlife at a few of them!

We zoomed through so very fast due to our overbooked afternoon schedule. But even in our few minutes of touring, we found inspiration. From mixed yard/habitat homes to luscious looming tropics to sheer vastness in variety of plant species to pure folly, we saw it all.

As is typical of me, I was drawn to the use of native plants and whimsy in the garden, as you can see in these select photos. But without a doubt, I saw some very unique and beautiful plants at all the homes. I greatly appreciate the lists of plants available at every location! And there was such creativity in layout and design and decor.

These little glimpses don't give much in the way of overview, I know. I regret that I'm posting so few pictures, but  I encourage you to visit Pam's blog at Digging, MSS at Zanthan Gardens, Jenny at Rock Rose , and Linda at Patchwork Garden for exceptional details and photos of the tour (so many of our pictures are of the same plants and garden wows, and I shamelessly admit that I'm taking advantage of the fact that they beat me to the blogging punch). I've got so many projects looming over me at the moment, but if I don't get something out, I'll get nothing out, if that makes sense. Life just isn't stopping still and letting me catch up! What's up with that?

Has it really only been a year? So much progress has been made in our first year of gardening that it's hard to believe it happened in a mere 365-ish days. Hey, I only about destroyed my back and my husband had to have knee surgery, but what does that matter when our yard is such a pleasant place to be now? (Ok, my husband just pointed out that we can't really blame gardening for our failing bodies, but it sounded good.)

What started it all? The felling of one very dead hackberry that was dangerously leaning over our house.

When that tree fell, I had no idea that I was about to embark on a gardening endeavour of massive proportions. But I looked around my yard and hated what I saw. It was time, after 13 years of doing nothing, to do something. Even if I had no clue whatsoever about what to do. 

But apparently I figured a few things out. The rest will come when I figure those out.

Here are a few tidbits of how our outdoor world has changed. Now be warned, the overgrown state has to do with all the rain we've finally been getting -- I haven't been able to clean anything up. At least things look more green...

The backyard, before and after:

The pond, before and after:

The back porch, before and after:

The front garden bed, before and after:

There's a lot more to our yard than what you see here, and I invite you to see more. We have a long way to go, but it's fun to take a look at how far we've come. You can also hear more about the story that got us on our gardening journey.

While taking a stroll near the butterfly garden, the sound of busy bees caught my attention, and I realized that my little pollinating friends had moved from the pumpkin flowers over to a nice big batch of native plants, and my gardener's heart did a little pitter-patter.

But in observing them, I realized something I'd never noticed before. Gregg's Mistflower produces white pollen.

My mind was boggled. In all my years watching wildlife, I never knew that pollen could be anything but yellow?

In the same patch of flowers, the honeybees on the Zexmenia had bright orange pollen baskets on their little legs.

This little bee has been to both Mistflower and Zexmenia. His pollen is pale orange.

I was fascinated. Today was a day where nature just had me reeling.

When I could tear my eyes away from the bees, I noticed a beautiful male Queen butterfly keeping me company.

And on the Fall Aster, newly blooming just on the other side of the Gregg's Mistflower, little hoverflies enjoyed a feast without getting the attention of the bigger bees nearby.   

Sure enough, these little flies can hover. Someone sure came up with a brilliant name for them! (Hey, guess what hoverflies eat? Aphids! Yay!)

Pollination inspiration, here's my poem for the day:

Flyby

Fly little fly

Fly little bee

Queen be flying

But not Queen Bee

Ah, Horseherb (Calyptocarpus vialis), also called Straggler Daisy. There doesn't seem to be much of a gray area on this one. People either truly love this little groundcover or hate it with a passion. I'm of the former variety. I adore this little plant.

Why do I love it? If you've ever walked past a field of horseherb, you are presented with an incredibly lush sea of green, with the daintiest of little yellow flowers throughout to catch your eye. I've seen some gorgeous fields, and each time I was mesmerized by the beauty and serenity of the scene. 

Field of horseherb at Hornsby Bend

I almost don't want to walk on it -- it's so pretty in appearance -- but for a non-lawn groundcover, it can withstand some foot traffic. It only needs water in the worst of droughts, and it loves shade and sun.

Horseherb is also native to the southern U.S. on into Central America, and it makes a great alternative to the exotic and water-hogging Bermuda and St. Augustine grasses. I'd love to see it replace Asian jasmine, as well -- now THAT is a plant that will take over a garden bed and yard. Horseherb is considered semi-evergreen, blooming most of the year except in cold winter areas, and if you like you can mow it, or you can let it grow to its typical max height, which is about 8 inches. But as bonus, horseherb also attracts small butterflies, including sulfurs and skippers. And think of all the happy little lizards that will zip underneath the foliage!

It's an eco-friendly solution to having a lawn without having to resort to heavy chemicals or fertilizers or ridiculous amounts of water to sustain it. Lawn irrigation tops the list on where our municipal water goes, and the time for water conservation is now, especially in Texas.

Why do some people want to leave it? Well, in some yards it can be a big nuisance. For those who keep a grass lawn, horseherb is a competitor, and it can be difficult to get rid of. And it can spread into garden beds, though I've found that so far it doesn't bother much with my well-mulched beds. In fact, one of the characteristics of this plant is that it supposedly doesn't do well in areas that have heavy leaves that take a long time to decompose. It spreads by both seeds and runners, which means that if the goal is to remove all of it, you're going to have a challenge. In a wildflower field, I have to imagine that it would be another competitor, but it's going to depend on the goals you have for your yard or area.

But for now I prefer to embrace its desire to spread. What I loathe is the Bermuda Grass and St. Augustine in my yard. I loathe the unnamed weeds that dominate my backyard. I love my buffalograss in the back, but it too is losing to the weeds, and in the drought, the buffalograss was dead most of the time, so I didn't end up loving it as much as I wanted to - I loved it when I could see it.

What would you choose: spotty grass or spreading horseherb? 

Will I regret it? Some gardeners are going to shout out an absolute yes to that question. But I do regret having Bermuda and St. Augustine (not that I planted it; that was the previous owners), so it's not a big deal to switch from frustration with the grasses to frustration with another groundcover, unless I've got all three to deal with at the same time. At least horseherb is native. But I'm going for the complete wildscape, and I have a lot of ground to fill and a lot of grass to get rid of. In those bed areas I want to keep maintained, I'll do my best to keep horseherb in check. And love it everywhere else!

So how about you? Do you prefer to love it or leave it?