Hummingbird and Butterfly Gardening: DAILY BUTTERFLIES Page 73, 1 by mellielong

mellielong wrote:
In the house, I've got a couple more Monarchs in their chrysalis, a few Gulf Frits in their chrysalis and one caterpillar, and a boatload of Cloudless Sulphurs. Right before it got cold, Mom told me she had seen a sulphur around my senna for a long time and she thought it was laying eggs. She was right, and I must have brought in close to a hundred. Sulphurs don't have the best sucess rate, especially in the first couple of instars. Last time I counted I had twenty-two, and I've lost two since then.

So as you see, I have a boatload of sulphur cats. My senna is toast, although I had some seedlings coming up in random spots that I managed to grab. I also have a cassia, but it's not looking so good. Luckily, the cassias at the museum look really good so I'll just pick some while I'm there tomorrow. My caterpillars are hungry! I think getting the eggs so early on and then providing them with just the tender new growth helped, but I've still never had this kind of success with sulphurs. I'll probably raise them to chrysalises and then take a bunch to the museum to help replenish the stock. I'm not sure how many butterflies we had make it through the cold, but I guess I'll find out tomorrow.

Oh, one weird thing. A few weeks ago at the museum I found three Sleepy Orange cats! I hadn't seen one in about two months, ever since the sicklepod died off. It was very strange, but they all became butterflies and I got to release two of them myself.

Here's the unidentified skipper I saw yesterday. Do you see what I mean about pansies (okay, I mixed in some violas, too) being the only thing blooming?

Melanie