The most frequent visitor of the garden are the sulphur butterflies. It’s truly stunning to see so many bright yellow butterflies fluttering about the garden all at once.
Here’s an orange-barred sulphur on a stunning zinnia.
I’m really excited about the two pathways that are going through the butterfly garden.
The brick pathway is through the first portion of the garden, which is complete. My daughter painted them years ago, but the paint has since come off, or fading a ton. I may have to scrub them clean, so she can create new designs on them again.
The stone pathway I began today to go through the second portion of the garden.
This pathway, although is very time consuming, I’m loving how it is turning out. My husband brought bricks home years ago and I never knew quite what to do with them. I started getting rid of them, a little every week, until an idea sprung.
I am now using a sledge hammer and breaking them to create another artsy pathway. It’s a huge jigsaw puzzle putting all the broken pieces together.
The best part of today, of course was watching the variety of butterflies that visited the garden while I was out there. We had monarchs, gulf fritillaries, orange barred sulphurs, great southern whites, dainty sulphurs, Cassius blue, polydamas swallowtail and one I got extremely excited about, the giant swallowtail. I sure have created an oasis!
The bahama cassia is crawling with orange barred sulphur caterpillars of every instar. You often times have to really search for the caterpillars, as they have great camouflage with the leaves.
The orange-barred sulphur butterflies absolutely love my candlestick cassia. They are constantly laying eggs on the edge of the leaves, continuing the lifecycle.
The female’s coloring changes from winter to summer, while the male remains bright yellow with an orange bar on its forewing, and a yellow hindwing with orange edges. The under surface of the male wings has small dark spots.
The caterpillars are pretty neat – those that eat the leaves are mainly green, while those that eat the yellow flowers are yellow.
I love walking out to the butterfly house and seeing new life. Its an instant smile.
The last orange barred sulphur emerged early this morning in the butterfly house.
This butterfly is one of abundance in the garden currently. I always spot multiple ones flying about, laying eggs, or sipping nectar. I have two of its host plants – the bahama cassia and candlestick cassia. They are planted on opposite corners of the garden and are thriving again, as I trimmed them both back. New growth is sprouting, mostly covered in eggs.
