Butterfly Gardener

Very cool instar stage of a spicebush caterpillar on my spicebush! Those eyes look so real! 🐛🦋

New addition to the butterfly garden! A Hardy Hibiscus! Perennial in zones 5 through 9. 🌻

They love the pink zinnias! ❤️

Not much butterfly action going on over here everyone. Sorry to report. Maybe if they would stop knocking down trees and building houses it would be like it used to be. 😧😭😤

Larson

Butterfly w**d, common milkw**d, and purple milkw**d!❤️🌼🌿

A carpenter bee and painted lady butterfly sharing a purple top verbena flower! ❤️ 🦋

Orange sulfurous Cosmos flowers are a butterfly magnet! Every year I toss the seeds around my yard in random places. Then, every year I sit there and try and determine whether what is growing is common Ragw**d or orange Cosmos flowers. 😂 Even Marigold leaves look very similar. My plant identification app also has trouble telling the difference. My solution is to wait until the small plants grow bigger so I can more easily identify if it is ragw**d. Orange sulfurous Cosmos and zinnias grow well together and are an absolute must for my butterfly garden every year! 🦋 Plant them early, as they take about 8 weeks to bloom!

"Clasping Venus Looking Glass" is a tiny spring blooming flower for the bees. It grows in full sun and poor soils. Sometimes leaving the "w**ds" is beneficial! 🌿🌱🐝

Butterfly Humor by Dave Coverly. https://www.gocomics.com/speedbump/2022/06/17

New addition to the Garden this year! Blue pincushion flower! 💙🦋🌼

Anyone discover any new favorite plants this year?

Just now finding out that there are canna lilies that are perennial here in zone 8A I've lived here 5 years and just discovered this! The sales associate was telling me something about some kind of worm that likes the plan and it closes something off on the plant with a thread and all you have to do is cut the thread and the part of the plant will pop back open. After some research, I have now learned about the Canna Leaf roller caterpillar! The larva of the brown skipper! He can roll my leaves any day, and I won't be cutting his little thread! 🦋 who has Canna lilies?

Our first Dutchman's pipevine bloom! Years in the making! 🦋

How is everyone's spring going? 🦋

It's been quite cold here in the upstate of South Carolina but I just found some common milkw**d sprouts coming up! 🦋

Dianthus are starting to bloom! Great for the early pollinators! 🦋

Journeynorth.org has started their spring 2023 Monarch migration map! This is where we are at so far! Report your sightings at journeynorth.org! 🦋

Let’s have some Butterfly fun!!
www.joyfulbutterfly.com

Anyone have catnip in their butterfly garden? Going to make it a new addition to my garden this year! 🌿🦋

Well, it's time to return our M3 sensor! If you are interested in participating in the University of Michigan's M3 Monarch Migration Challenge, follow the link below to sign up! You will be collecting data that contributes to the study of monarch migration! 🦋

https://monarch.engin.umich.edu/join-the-project/

To all of you guys

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Gummy Worm Caterpillar (Olona sp), photo taken by Bryan