Butterflies- part 1 of 2 Pic posts
Jul. 14th, 2020 10:48 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
feng_shui_houseI have no idea what species of moth this is- it clung to my window for several minutes with the light passing through the wings.
I have only seen this caterpillar twice- and only twice the adult -both times the adults were very tatter winged, and both times the caterpillars disappeared in days. Pity, because the Ruddy Daggerwing butterfly is lovely. The caterpillars feed exclusively on fig plants-there is a wild fig plant native to the general area, but none of them in suburbia, and hardly any domestic figs (never, so far as I know, sold at garden centers- I bought my fig tree almost as a joke many decades ago- pre internet, clipped a coupon in the newspaper and spent fifty cents for two tiny twigs of fig plants- gave one away & it promptly died, but mine still lives! Hardly ever get fruit from it mostly because it's shaded by big tree next to it. This year has been a GOOD one for it- I have got- one at a time- 3 figs.) This caterpillar lasted 2 days. I guess someone ate it. Oh well...
The white peacock butterfly is an uncommon visitor- it likes to feed on a weed that I really can't let live very long because it spreads so prolifically I'd have nothing else. Also the seeds are 'hitchhikers' and get all over my clothes and I have to pick them out of the laundry. Seeds ITCH in your underwear.
Now the Gulf fritillary caterpillar feeds on a weed that I can often let live- Passion vine- it has pretty green leaves and climbs up stuff but doesn't generally kill the plant it's on. I believe a few other species of butterfly like it, which is why I tend to see a few species nearly every day.
The red background is an out of focus old recycling bin, the city stopped using them long ago, but instead of throwing mine out I filled them up with soil and use them for planters. A willful waste leads to a woeful want... repair! reuse! repurpose! reduce! recycle!
A lot of the adult butterflies I see like to feed on the nectar from lantana blossoms. The lantana plants are all volunteers- birds eat the berries and distribute the seeds (lizards eat the berries, too.) Lantana is a nice plant, blooms almost constantly for me. I try not to touch it bare handed because it can cause contact dermatitis in some people and I'd rather not discover I'm one of them.
The zebra longing has a fairly obvious name! This and the Julia Heliconia are both common visitors to my yard- I think both species can use Passion Vine as host plants- and they both have the long wings, so possibly far back in evolution they were related.
The bougainvillea isn't as often attractive to butterflies. The actual flower is the tiny white part inside the colorful pseudo-petal leaves. But when they DO feed on the flowers, it looks very pretty.
A few years ago I let some new to me volunteer weeds grow to maturity because they weren't in an area I mow. Turned out they're probably 'cassia' which is a host plant for some small sulphur butterflies (possibly others, but the clouded sulphur is the one I'm sure of, as I've seen them laying eggs on it.) They do feed on other plants as adults- this one is nectaring on yet another volunteer plant, a wood sorrel- very small plant looks like nothing special, but if allowed to grow to maturity, has pretty little flowers that some small butterflies like.
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Date: 2020-07-14 03:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-14 03:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-14 03:58 pm (UTC)Seriously though, butterflies are fuuuuuun! We're in sulfur, red admiral, monarch and viceroy territory, among many, many others, and we have white cabbage moths everywhere.
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Date: 2020-07-14 04:03 pm (UTC)I saw a red admiral once, and on rare occasions a monarch- had a soldier butterfly come by a few years ago.
If I had more room I'd like to grow milkweed- monarchs need help.
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Date: 2020-07-14 04:18 pm (UTC)We're in prime milkweed territory. It grows wild here, and lots of people plant it deliberately to attract monarchs as well as multiple other species. Everybody wins. I'd plant some, but I haven't got space beyond a windowsill, which for obvious reasons won't work! My father ended up pulling his milkweed up, though, because evidently it got ridiculously tall on him.
Confession. I forget whereabouts you are, though I imagine you're west of me since you get different species of blues, and we really don't see those here at all.
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Date: 2020-07-14 04:23 pm (UTC)The land of HOT so much HOT. I'm trying to grow some zinnia and marigold flowers from old seeds (I got carried away 2 years ago at Walmart) but I have to go out and water them like 3-4 times a day until they get strong enough to withstand the FIRE.
If I get zinnias growing good, maybe some butterflies will feed on them.
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Date: 2020-07-14 05:31 pm (UTC)Good luck with the zinnias! Marigolds are fairly forgiving, at least from the experiences I've had with them. Granted I was a kid then, so...
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Date: 2020-07-15 12:02 am (UTC)https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaLYVHz7k00&feature=youtu.be
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Date: 2020-07-15 01:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-15 01:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-15 07:21 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-15 01:07 pm (UTC)