In the garden

August 29, 2013 by KTgreen

I can’t resist posting pictures of the butterflies. Each week it seems I’m getting another variety of Swallowtail and this week two different types arrived! This has definitely been the best year I’ve had for butterflies.

In the Garden, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail — Eastern Tiger Swallowtail and Zebra Longwing on Pagoda Plant

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail, In the Garden — Eastern Tiger Swallowtail and Giant Swallowtail on hummingbird bush.

Eastern Tiger Swallowtail — One more pic of the Eastern Swallowtail

The other variety showed up yesterday. This one is a Palamedes Swallowtail and is huge! I didn’t get a very good picture of it but will try for a better one for next week.

Palamedes Swallowtail, the the Garden — Palamedes Swallowtail

I planted this vine to cover up the fence and it does a really good job. It’s an annual and I can never remember its name but always find the seed packet at Home Depot. Might be a cross vine. It has sweet little red trumpets on a delicate fringelike vine.

I have a lot of butterfly and hummingbird plants but I think this patch of sunshine flowers attract most of the butterflies. There are some cosmos, zinnias, black-eyed susan, and purple coneflowers. I mow them down when they get really ugly in November and they all come back the next year. So easy! So rewarding!

Cosmos, in the garden — Cosmos and Zinnias

Eastern Black Swallowtail — I can’t get a picture of a hummingbird but this eastern black swallowtail struck a pose.

And one last picture from the garden, not only butterfly friendly, birds like to hide in the jatropha. This guy is waiting for me to fill the bird feeders.

In the Garden

August 22, 2013 by KTgreen

I was in North Dakota for two weeks and returned to find some changes in my gardens. First, my parsley patch was stripped down to the stems. The only plant remaining was covered with Eastern Black Swallowtail butterfly caterpillars.

In the Garden — The eastern black swallowtail caterpillar morphs through several phases. Here you can see the 3rd instar on the left, 4th in the middle and 5th on the right.

I planted banana trees a few years ago to camouflage the fence plus provide a little privacy. They appear to have grown a few feet since we left!

And there’s a flower on one of the trees! Is a banana stalk next?

I don’t think we’ve had this butterfly before. Or if we did, I didn’t get any pictures of it! After doing some research, I’ve decided that it’s a White Peacock Butterfly. According to the book, it’s quite common in Florida.

We have more Gulf Fritillaries than we have Swallowtails. We get a lot of them every year. I think that they are attracted to the yellow and orange cosmos that reseed themselves. Plus I have passionflower vine growing on the fence that is one of their host plants. I liked the colors in this photo.

I have no idea what kind of moth this is. We seem to have more moths than usual since our return. It’s hard to get pictures of them because they flit around so quickly.

Butterflies and Moths in the Garden

August 15, 2013 by KTgreen