I had one buckeye this year. They are one of my favs. I have had several question marks this year though.
Mrs_ED..I can remember two years back we had nothing for a long time. It is good to see them back. Maybe next year they will be there in droves!
DAILY BUTTERFLIES Page 71
Pearl Crescent on an Aster.
I've been seeing lots of Buckeyes in the last couple of weeks.
Here's one on Climbing Hempvine. This plant seems to attract a lot of BFs. I saw Buckeyes, Crescents and skippers on them.
This message was edited Oct 21, 2009 3:59 PM
The Hempvine attracted a few other critters too.
Honey Bee
It attracts preditors also, this mantis is eating a Pearl Crescent.
And this spider munching on another bug.
Our butterfly festival starts tomorrow. I've been visiting the local parks to see what's flying. Butterflies are picking up - lots of Common Buckeyes, White Peacocks, Mexican Bluewings and Large Orange Sulphurs. Queens and Snouts are a given - there's so many of those it's tiresome to look at all the plants trying to find something different :o)
Saw the usual suspects but did see three Ruddy Daggerwings, a couple of Malachites, one Banded Peacock and a Question Mark.
The forecast is predicting rain for the next two days - no sign of the weather changing yet - so hopefully it will be a nice day for the tours.
I best get to sleep - have to co-lead a tour tomorrow!!!
Here's one of the Ruddy Daggerwings :o)
~ Cat
...and just to show off the gobs of Queens - this is just one small part of the mistflower bush - every mistflower bush in the park is full of Queens :o) At least they will be doing the 'wave' when folks walk by them :o) That always brings smiles to everyone's face!
~ Cat
Those Queens sure love those mistflowers. : ) For some reason my mistflowers have not bloomed yet, this year. I don't know what's wrong with them. I don't even see any buds coming on them. Hmmmm...
~Lucy
My Mist Flowers are blooming nicely, but haven't been for long. I sure wanted to get down to south TX this year to see the migration. A busy October is keeping me away this year. Also my Niece's little one will turn 5yrs old this weekend and I can't miss that. He is my sudo-DGS! Since I don't have any G kids my Sister said I could share. LOL!
Glad you guys have had rain and it's perking up everything down there. We have had some heavy rains already today and the cold front isn't even through here yet.
This is what my lower part of my back yard looked like this evening before dark. I had to wade through it and lift a section of fence to keep debris moving. That dropped the level about 4 " so it helped some. As long as the rain is slow we don't have a problem but this was about 30 minutes of hard rain. The bed on the right is actually about 16" tall. Glad I take my caterpillars inside and keep the chrysalis inside, otherwise I would be worried they all washed away. I just put mulch on a fence bed back there and it is suppose to be the no-float type; but I dare say it would stay in place with running water.
This message was edited Oct 22, 2009 12:05 AM
Lone Sulphur is about the only BF noted around here.
Looks like a 'gully washer' there in Ft Worth.
Impressive congregation of Queens TPP.
although this Cabbage Loper Moth later found the same tattered sunflower...
Saw some of these yesterday morning, not a very good pic. I believe they're Painted Ladies, on White Mistflower. These mistflowers bloomed late, so they haven't even reached full bloom yet, but they sure look nice and are really drawing in some butterflies...still only a fraction of what they would normally get in fall and that's really disappointing! The Frostweed blooms are late also and only a fraction of what we would normally have. While driving to the city and back yesterday, I saw a few Monarchs flying by. Peak migration time is over, but at least a few are flying south through this area.
This message was edited Oct 25, 2009 5:50 PM
I found a Palamedes Caterpillar! Woo-hoo! Notice his all white booty; Spicebushies have a brown patch on their butts.
Had this Tiger ST hanging out on my pentas for hours - literally!
Caught the Zebra Longwings roosting with a Polydamas (was he lost?) in the flight cage at the museum.
In other news, Mom saw a Buckeye yesterday - our first one in a while. I went out and rounded up dozens of Monarch eggs and have seen a few flying around the house and the museum. They started hatching yesterday; I'll have to take some to the museum because I know I can't feed this entire herd.
Melanie
Painted Lady here too...
Found this moth caterpillar curled up in the yard
Hi guys,
I haven't posted in awhile. Boy everyone's got some great pics. Mellie, I've still got lots of Pipevine if you want to send some Polydamas over here.
Not many Monarchs here this year, even with me raising about 20 of them, they'd hang around but not lay a ton of eggs. We did have a boat load of Queens tho ! And the Longtail skippers are really abundant, and making great use of the Blue Butterly Pea vine for their babies.
The Tiger Swallowtail was so intent on the Mexican Flame Vine flowers I was able to get really close. I'm hoping I can get out and get more pics this week.
Yesterday we had a brief sunshine period and I captured the Queens and Monarchs loading up at the W TX Mistflower. Three Queens and two Monarchs in this pic.
These two Queens kept landing on the same bloom, guess because it was standing the tallest.
This is not a pretty plant but definately draws the bfs.
Wow! I'll say. It must be pretty tasty.
Today was windy! But I saw a Question Mark and also the first GST I've seen in quite a while in my yard! Wonder if it's too late to hope for GST eggs.
The Queens are taking over my yard. I have one medium sized mistflower bush and there must've been at least 100 Queens nectaring on it. Not much of any other species - grrrrrr!!!
Having so many Queens in my yard means my milkweeds are going to get hit. I've already seen a bunch of freshly laid eggs on them. Any takers? D-mail me.
~ Cat
ha. not me. it's almost all dead up here!;-)
I would be willing, I still have MW, but they usually aren't laying eggs up here this time of year. Do you think there would be time to raise them and release up here?
I've got a ton of Queens here too. My milkweed hasn't quite recovered from the last batch. I've seen a very few monarchs...
Tons of GST's Tiger ST's, Sulphers, and even a few BST's. My fennel is gone, along w/ the parsley. No pipevine's tho...errrrrr.
Saw a yellow butterfly laying eggs on a Christmas senna sapling (now a tree) I received in a trade last year (yippee! it's working!) didn't get a good look at the butterfly - am thinking perhaps it was a Cloudless Sulphur. Time will tell :o)
~ Cat
ps...am so glad they found the little tree - I'd been waiting for them to make use of it!!! YIPPEE!!!
Cat, sometime when you're at the butterfly park or somewhere like that, take a pic of one of those Malachites and post ....I love to see those!
Several Question Mark butteflies found the old banana I put out for fruit feasters.
A Lady...is it Painted?
Cat,
That looks like a sulpher egg. I finally got some sulphers to lay eggs on my Cassia alata plants after 3 years. I don't know what took them so long to find it, but now that they did, they've been hanging around. Here's a close up of a cloudless sulpher egg. They start out white, and turn orange as they mature.
Mark
Here she is just before laying another egg:
I think this is a male cloudless, nectaring on a Turk's cap. These Turk's caps are good for taking photos cause they have to work their proboscis in from the side, and it takes them about 5 to 10 seconds to do that.
A monarch was hanging around that day too:
I got a couple of open-wing shots.
It's hard to aim the camera when you zoom in too close.
Linda....Looks like an American Lady to me. The four dots on the dorsal side of the PL are real uniform. Those of the AL vary in size, almost touching. But I have been known to be way off mark! lol!
Nice shots La Mark.
Thanks, Sheila, you're probably right. Now, today was Red Admiral Day. One even landed on my shirt as soon as I went through the back gate. That was odd. But I was more prepared with my camera for this one that just lighted on a rock right by me. I'm raiding my fridge for fruit for the fruit feasters! Not much left in there.
