Monthly Archives: August 2024

Graceful

Posted on by
Reply

Graceful comes to mind when I see the giant swallowtail glide through the garden. This butterfly grabbed my attention immediately and held it as it fluttered throughout the garden, landing on my wild lime to deposit eggs, as well as nectar from my red penta flower.

The giant swallowtail’s forewing spans 11.7 to 17.5 cm for males and a span of 13.5 to 18.8 cm for females. The demand your attention when they flutter in the garden, just for the pure size of them.

The females tend to lay single eggs, cream to brown, on the upper surface of leaves – citrus plants – that are 1 to 1.5 mm in size. The larval, caterpillars, will go through five instars (stages) and they mainly eat at night.

More eggs

Posted on by
Reply

Did you know that a female monarch butterfly can lay anywhere between 300 to 500 eggs over two to five weeks? This butterfly spent a good amount of time choosing many giant milkweed leaves to lay her eggs.

According to Monarch Joint Venture, prior to fertilization, the egg is formed, as well as the hard outer shell – chorion – as this protects the developing larvae. This outer shell has a layer of wax to help prevent the egg from drying out. The monarch egg also has micropyles, which are tiny funnel-shaped openings.

In about three to five days, a tiny monarch caterpillar will appear.

According to “Florida Butterfly Caterpillars and Their Host Plant” (Marc C. Minno, Jerry F. Butler and Donald W. Hall), the milkweed plant has latex within that sticks to the mouthparts of herbivores. The caterpillars will cut the leaves near the base of the milkweed blade to drain out that latex before they begin eating.

A must have

Posted on by
Reply

Do you want an easy to grow flower that is a great butterfly attractor?

Buy some zinnia seeds. Joyful Butterfly has a great selection of seeds.

Zinnias are by far the easiest flower to grow, especially because they reseed and spread throughout the garden.

Sulphur galore

Posted on by
Reply

The temperatures have been a little cooler, by that I meam a few degrees – still 90s/80s, and a nice, a bit cooler wind, so I’ve gravitated back into the garden after apparently ignoring it for way too long. All of the rain has made everything double, if not triple in size, including the weeds.

So, I’ve decided to tackle the farthest point of the garden and move backward. This area includes a section near my candlestick cassia. The tree is growing in every direction and is crawling with sulphur caterpillars, both orange barred and cloudless sulphur caterpillars.

When cutting back my scorpion tail, I found quite a few chrysalis, which have been moved to my butterfly house.

Busy beauty

Posted on by
Reply

The orange barred sulphur butterflies have been super busy in the garden the last few days. This one continuously stopped and deposited eggs on my bahama cassia tree, which will soon be crawling with caterpillars.