My daughter and I went back to The Butterfly Estates in Downtown Fort Myers this morning and again became lost in the beauty surrounding us.

The Florida Native Butterfly Society, which is a nonprofit organization, helps in protecting and preserving these beautiful inspects. Every now and again they will share that they have an abundance of butterfly eggs to share for a small donation. Yesterday that announcement came for the Julia butterfly and today we were there picking up our eggs to raise at home. We asked for 10, as my friend wants to raise some too, and they provided many more to make sure we did end up with 10 Julia butterflies.

The host plant is that of the passion-vine family, which we have a plentiful supply. The hope is we can bring some to the garden after raising some in our butterfly house. The eggs are yellow and the caterpillars are brown with white spots and black spines. I am excited to watch the life cycle.

According to Florida Wildflower Foundation it is known as the Julia heliconian and Flambeau, the flame and belong to the brush-footed family. Their wingspan can range up to 9.2 cm.

Just like the zebra longwing, they too visit a food source repeatedly along a set route. They are year round visitors in Southern Florida.

As we strolled through the butterfly house this morning there were tons of Julia butterflies mating, sipping on nectar, resting and flying about. It was a beautiful sea of orange every where you looked. The female is duller in color with more black markings, while the male is brighter orange with narrow black borders.