In September, the Atala butterfly, Eumaeus atala poey, found my garden and left behind some eggs on its host plant, coontie. The exciting part about this is I planted its host plant earlier this year – plant it and they will come!!
This incredibly stunning, largest, iridescent hairstreak in southeastern Florida, was thought to be extinct from 1937 to 1959. The atala butterfly are mostly found in Palm Beach, Broward and Miami-Dade counties, but with the help of butterfly enthusiasts’ colonies have begun in other areas of southern Florida, such as Martin, Monroe, Collier and Lee County.
These little beauties are small in size, ranging from 2 cm to 2.7 cm. The University of Florida states that the females have bright iridescent royal blue on the upper surface of the forewing, while the male is iridescent Caribbean blue, or teal green scales on the upper and lower wings.
The eggs, which are laid on the newest growth of its host plant, coontie, can be laid in clusters up to 60 eggs. The University of Florida states that the eggs, through proteins secreted by the female, are glued to the surface of the coontie plant and are clear on the underside.
The eggs hatched on Oct. 6, after being laid on Sept. 28, and the butterflies began emerging on Nov. 7. Quite the cycle for these little beauties. Many of them created their chrysalis right on the coontie plant, while a few crawled up to the top of the mesh enclosure and created it there.
I have quite a few of its favorite nectar plants in the garden, sweet almond bush – which right now unfortunately does not have any fragrant flowers, and the scorpion tail, which is pictured below. Others include native lantana, bloodberry, wild coffee, porterweed, beautyberry, indigoberry, Florida privet, rougeplant, firebush, salvia, Spansh needles, cabbage palm, as well as Dahoon Holly, Blackbead, Florida Fiddlewood, avocado, live oak, wild lime and golden dewdrops.
Here are an abundance of photos from the eggs to the half a dozen we have released into our garden. My daughter and I spotted one in the garden yesterday, which we hope will be a frequent thing as we would love to have a colony in our garden.
