The first couple of weeks after hurricane Katrina I didn't notice much different in my yard other than the damage caused by the storm. I was cleaning up and didn't have time to notice the changes in my butterfly population.
Over the last couple of weeks I have gotten my act together and I am back to walking my yard a lot more. During this period I have not seen a single Zebra Longwing (Heliconius charitonius) in my yard. Prior to Katrina, the Zebra Longwings were the predominent butterfly in the yard. They were here year round. Now they are gone. Their favorite nectar plants lantana, firebush and pentas are fine, I only lost a few branches of each. Their larvae plant a passionflower is intact, it received no damage.
Anyone have any input on this.
Thanks,
Art
Misssing butterflies after hurricane Katrina
Sorry to hear that Art. Maybe they were able to fly off somewhere safe and make a new home for a while. Since your plants weren't damaged, you'd think that if there were any eggs that they would be ok. Have you seen any cats or butterflies since you posted?
Hi KKB. I hadn't been looking for eggs or cats. The foliage is very dense from all the rain we have had. With all the cleaning up, trimming, and thinning I have been doing, I could have thrown some of them away. However, the plants these two normally lay eggs in were, mostly intact. I have used no pesticide or other sprays here.
Friday afternoon I saw a single Zebra Longwing. This is the first sighting of a ZL since Katrina.
For about a week now I have seen a single GF. I say single because I only saw one. Usually there are little groups of 4 or 5 of the ZL & GF's. They are the two predominent butterflies in the yard.
There have been more sulphurs and whites than I normaly see. And the Monarchs are steady at about two to three a day. I have increased my milkweed plants so the Monarchs are steady.
I have a tip for you on growing milkweed plants. It came up in another forum here. I tried it and it works very good. One of the ladies suggested when you take a cutting of milkweed, burn or singe the cut end with a flame from say a cigarette or grill lighter. Singe it good until it doesn't leak milk anymore. You then put it in water or dirt and it will send out roots very fast. I have tried this on other plants and bushes with "milk" in them and the same result. They take very fast. I have Frangipani that took in three weeks using this technique. Milkweed are growing in about 7-10 days.
I have increased all my butterfly plants both nectar and larvae plants by a lot. Loosing a variety of (non butterfly/moth) bushes and plants during the storm gave me a good excuse to go out and purchase more. I even cheated a bit and cut down a few extra bushes so I could get more butterfly stuff. I specifically went looking for native larvae and nectar plants and really loaded up with them.
There has actually been an increase in the normal butterflies that pass through the yard probably due to the added plants. I get a good variety of butterflies here. Often more than I can ID. The big problem was the total absence of the ZL and GF's. These two were just not here. There could have been others missing also, but I wouldn't have noticed since the others appear singely and less frequently than these two which appear in groups.
Perhaps now that I have seen one of each, this might indicate they are coming back.
It's funny how you get used to seeing these guys around all the time, you sometimes take them for granted. Then something happens and they are gone. You really miss them.
Art
Sounds like you've been busy! I'm sorry that you lost some plants, but it's always fun to buy new ones! You'll have to let us know what new things you got.
That's a great idea for the milkweed!! I have never heard of that, but will try it today. I usually cut off a piece to feed to the cats, so I can try and reroot those. It might be too late to get much out of them, but enough time to try it. Thanks!
I have seen the many pics from you all in FL, and you do have a great variety of butterflies. I'm sure that eventually the GF's and the LW's will come back. Last year I had a lot more GF's than this year. This year my vine is huge too, but I'm having to rescue eggs off of it now because the ants are getting them. When they hatch and get a little bigger I put the cats back on it.
Monarchs are finally coming to my garden regularly too! I just LOVE it!! I just stand out there smiling, wanting to shout "THIS IS IT...THE REASON I DO IT!!" :)
KKB, tell me about your feeding a piece of milkweed to the cats. Which part do you usually feed the cats?
Thanks!
For some reason it's been a little harder this year. I've apparently forgotten what I normally do. LOL In the past I've put pieces in a small vase and put them in the cage, but I think that only works when the plants are small.
My plants now are large and have thick trunks. I have cut off the new side shoots on some and the cats love those because they are new and tender. I cut the a portion of the top on the older plants, wrap the end in a wet paper towel then cover it in foil. It stays fresh for a day or so.
They like the flowers, buds and pods, but I'm trying to leave as many pods as possible right now. They can get kind of picky tho and roam around looking for soft leaves. All of my larger cats either have made or are making their chrysalis today. The babies are doing ok eating leaves that I bring in and lay down. I don't like to do that because it's not "natural", but when I put them outside something eats them. Better off eating laying down. lol
Do you have Queen butterflies there? I love these and their cats. The cats are so colorful! (Pardon the dirt under my nails...other gardeners understand tho)
Art:
Last summer right at the height of butterfly season or mid-summer we had two hurricanes which passed through very near here. The eye of Charlie passed through 30 miles to the south and east doing horrendous damages to PuntaGorda and Arcadia which were in the eye. We got high winds but nothing like those closer to the center. About a week after that another one came through going in a Southeast to Northwest direction. I think the eye came ashore between your location and Cape Canaveral and passed through Polk County (as did the remnants of Charlie). I can't recall it's name. Again we got high winds but not hurricane force winds. I had a lot of tall, unsupported plants blown down and my yard was full of debris from the oaks both times but many butterfly nectar plants and host plants survived for the butterflies. The Sulphurs did not seem to be diminished in numbers by the storm and we still had a few monarchs but the Zebra Longwings and the Gulf Fritillaries and the White Peacocks and all the Swallowtails and many of the Skippers disappeared completely. I guess with frequency of the storms and the destructive force of the winds we received both times we should be wondering how do the Sulphurs seem to get through it so well. I know that after the storms we had Sulphurs and Monarchs on through the rest of the year but it was not until late this summer that the numbers of the Zebra Longwings have become somewhat near normal and the Gulf Fritillaries have not yet returned to the the numbers that I was seeing when the strorms hit last summer. I think they were probably blown up into Georgia or North Carolina somewhere and probably most were destroyed in the process. Many of the host plants and nectar plants in the areas which received direct hits were probably destroyed. I presume that regions which were vaccumned clean of butterflies will be repopulated from the regions which did not receive direct hits but it will take some time. BUT what about those Sulphurs. They must have a secret method of surviving wind storms.
KKB, we have Queen butterflies here, but I have not seen their cats. Then again, there are lots of butterflies I don't see cats for. I think it's my lizards eating the cats.
My recently passed pet cat used to keep the lizards in check. I remember before he passed my larvae plants would see lots of action and I could watch the cats get bigger. I never got into raising them, but I would watch them every day as I made my rounds. I have spurts of cat action now, rather than the constant action before he passed, and the summer storms hit. It's hard to come up with a rational explanation so I guess I grope for anything that I think will provide a reason for this to have happened. It just might be a natural thing I have no control over.
Ed, I am still seeing lots of butterflies of all varities that frequent this area, but the GF & Zl's. In fact, I am seeing more and more swallowtails. Often I can't tell what they are, but they are here. They don't feed here yet, but they do lay eggs here, same with the sulphurs and whites, they are here just for the host plants. I can usually only tell the swallowtails by the cats.
I did see one ZL this morning and another late in the afternoon. I didn't notice any GF's. It was very breezy all day long. The breeze could have kept them away.
Buterfly activety is picking up in the yard. Things are back to normal. Lot's of GF's and now a few ZL's. Monarchs wiped out my six scattered milkweed plants, including the all yellow one over the weekend. They did miss the two growing in my shade fabric covered nursery area. My recently found wild cork bark passion flower plants are all hosting GF & ZL cats.
The recent addition of three Mexican Flame Vine plants just beginning to flower has helped draw butterflies to my North border. I also inserted a dozen, grown from cuttings, Blue, Purple, Red and Pink Porterweeds in between my groupings of Bougainvillea. There are also wild Shepherd's Needles and Wild Poinsetta weeds growing there. This is my first time having porterweeds in the full sun. These babies are going to become small trees over there.
Yesterday for the first time I saw a pair of Giant Swallowtail's in the yard. It was unusual for me to see two butterflies fly side by side around the yard. I usually only see this with the ZL's. They started out by the red porterweed and followed the yard all the way around to the Wild Lime tree (about 450 ft from where they started.) They were gone by the time I had my camera, but that's no excuse. I wouldn't have gotten a good picture anyway. They are way too fast for me.
At any rate, I feel much better the butterflies that had been missing since the hurricanes are back home again.
Art
So glad to hear that things are lively again! Sounds like those two GST's were scouting out that lime tree, so you might have some more of those soon too.
We do have ZL's in my area, but I have never seen any at my house. I'm hoping that someday they will smell my passionvine!
I just love Porterweed. I had a beautiful coral one last year and had hoped that it would come back this year, but it didn't. Just recently tho I realized that a partially hidden plant that I had been watching was a baby Porterweed. It must have come from seed. It was being crowded by milkweed so I decided to chance it and move it. It did ok for a few days but started looking bad so I put it in a pot in the shade and am still waiting for it to perk up. I have a blue one that is doing well but not near as big and pretty as the coral was last year. Did you get the cuttings from someone one Dave's? Will they be perennial for you? I might have to hit you up for a cutting next spring. :)
Hi KKB. The Giant Swallowtails have laid eggs on that bush (it's not quite a tree yet) ever since I have had it. But usually that's the only reason they are in my yard. Until the last few days I have not seen them stop for nectar here. I don't think I had enough nectar plants in my yard.
Now that I am changing my yard to a garden I am placing more emphasis on flowers large butterflies frequent for nectar. My latest effort was to move a good sized Duranta Golden Dewdrop from the shade to the North West Fence corner where it will be in sun most of the day. When it begins to bloom I expect larger butterflies to frequent it more than they did when it was in the shade and didn't bloom very much.
I get most of my plants from cuttings. I belong to a small group (the S Fla Galloping Gardeners) that is now up to 5 that visit nurseries and garden attractions in our tri county area. We visit and take cuttings wherever we go. Occasionally we visit each others gardens and of course leave with cuttings. Whenever we GT, we request plants from each other. Usually someone in the group has what one of us is looking for.
From the birds this year I got my Red Porterweeds and a light Red almost Pink Porterweed. I had Purple Porterweed for years. Val, one of our group gave me cuttings of her Pink Porterweed and I picked up cuttings of the Blue Porterweed for the group at a recent visit we made to Butterfly World. The Pink and Blue grow very big, perhaps as tall as ten feet.
The normal height for all of them where I usually grow them in the shade is about 3 to 4 feet.
Here in South Florida they are perennial and bloom all year round.
If you remind me a month or so before your growing season, I will make cuttings of whatever colors you want. When they have good roots I will send them to you.
Art
Oh, thank you so much Art! I will do that. The Porterweed has not been discovered by the nurseries in my area. One occassionally has some odd things and that's where I found the blue one this year. I got the coral one last year in Dallas at a plant sale by the Texas Discovery Gardens.
It was at TDG butterfly exhibit a few years ago that I first saw the Duranta bushes. I took some pics, searched and finally found what they were. Then I had to search for them and found one in an odd place. Then the next year even Wal-Mart was carrying them. I've got 2 and just love them, but I'm going to have to move mine around too. I have taken a cutting from a plant at our local botanical gardens (which I'm not sure was legal?) but I don't know if I would be daring enough to at the butterfly exhibit.
I noticed this morning that my transplanted Porterweed is perking back up! Yay! Now I just have to keep it alive all winter. That's where my friend's new greenhouse might be handy!
Do you grow milkweed for Monarchs? I'm watching them and the Queen's this morning.
Hi KKB, Yes, I grow the milkweeds just for the Monarchs. Although there is usually a presence by Monarchs all year, they really get heavy here in the winter time. I do cut the milkweeds so they will branch then use the cuttings to make more of them. I spread them around the yard hoping they will miss one or two of them so other Monarchs can have at it too.
Taking cuttings is all in the technique. Ya gotta be sneaky, or have a lookout. LOL A box cutter is very handy for cutting in public places. You can hold them unseen in your hand while pretending to look closley at a plant. At the critical moment you slip the blade out, make your cutting, pull back in the blade and put the cutting in your hand. I have been at this for years. I do try to take cuttings from inconspicuious places on the plant so I don't spoil it's appearance and I only take what I need, not an inch more.
I am really looking forward to what the Duranta will attract on the North side. It would be so nice to have some of the larger butterflies hang around the yard more rather than just lay eggs and leave. I think the combination of the new porterweeds, Mexican Flame Vine and the Duranta will do the trick, at least until I get more larger flowers in the mix.
Don't forget to remind me a month or so before you will need the porterweeds.
Art
LOL! We gardeners know what we want! I did have lookouts when I got my cuttings at the Botanic Gardens. I had been there a few weeks prior and saw a few things I had to have. The one I HAD to have was what I recently learned is Cat's Whiskers. My friends and I had our backpacks equipped with tiny pruners, baggies and markers. I had them "cover me" while I took a small snippet of this plant. I kept it inside all winter and put it out this spring. It has done well. I've got another piece that broke off rooting now and I'll put it in a pot in case it's not perennial here.
I have some Flamingo celosia, a pale purple Gomphrena and a small False Sunflower plant that all came from seeds on that trip. It's about that time of year to go see what seeds I might want!
I remembered after I posted that you do grow milkweed because you were the one that told me how to burn the ends. I have a piece inside that I was testing, and sure enough it has roots! Thanks so much for sharing that great tip!
Art:
Since you grow many plants from cuttings and share them with folks near and far, I wonder if you would be so kind as to share a foolproof recipe for preparing cuttings for shipment to other locations--Like from Florida to Mississippi or Florida to Texas? How do you wrap the roots and tops so that they have enough but not too much moisture for the trip? How do you fasten them down so they don't break from excessive movement inside the carton? I would be most grateful.
While I am asking, how did it ever occur to you to cauterize the bottom of the stem of a milk weed plant in order to get it to take root more quickly? I haven't tried that yet but have heard several folk say that it works.
Thanks.
Hi Ed. I don't ship cuttings and about the only people I share cuttings with are usually in our local garden club, S Fl Galloping Gardeners. I offered to grow cuttings and ship when it has roots to KKB in this thread.
Since I have been on Dave's I have only swapped plants once and seeds once. I don't have that much stuff that people want. I run a pretty simple yard. The plants that KKB wanted are everywhere here in Florida, but apparently not that common in Texas.
Sugarweed and Happy_1 here mentioned to me to singe cut edges of milk leaking plants to make them take faster. I have been passing it around ever since. It works very good for milk leaking plants. I have had frangipani take in three weeks using this technique. Milkweed take in two weeks. The only milk leaking plant that this hasn't worked on yet is my Cherries Jubilee Alamanda. I have always had a hard time getting cuttings of these alamanda plants to take. It probably took six months or more of making cuttings every week of a neighbors alamanda to get the alamanda plant I have now.
The plant swap plant I received and a couple of plants I purchased that were shipped by mail all came the same way. The swapped plant had it's roots wrapped in a wet paper towel. Around the root ball covered with paper towel they wrapped a cut down plastic bag and secured it with a tie wrap. The rest of the plant was also covered with it's own plastic bag and also tied. Then they were wrapped with newspaper and put into a box with room to spare.
Then the box was filled with crumpled newspaper or shredded paper to keep them from moving about. I have received a few plants this way without problem. If I remember correctly, all shipments were by US priority mail. It was noted to me when I ship plants out I should ship them on Monday so they aren't spending an extra day or two waiting for a delivery date.
The purchased plants were in pots of moist potting medium but still packaged the same way as above.
Art
It's been over two weeks since Wilma came and went. The yard is still a mess but the plants are coming back.
Wilma produced the same results as far as loss of butterflies as Katrina. Most were not around for about a week after Wilma. Now they are beginning to return. The sad part is there is not much for them to nectar on here. Only a few Spanish Needles and Spicy Jathropa Jatropha integerrima have flowers left.
The larvae plants are up and growing new leaves, but I can't see much action on them.
My Mexican Flame Vines are producing buds and should flower shortly. I have three of them on a 60' span of chain link fence. These flowers should help. My Schefflera 'Nova' Schefflera actinophylla is budding up. This is my biggest butterfly nectar plant in the yard. It was only tilted slightly. It was the first plant I righted after the storm.
My two Coral Bush, Jatropha multifida and several Flaming Glory Bower, Clerodendrum speciosissimum are budding up too.
I have been hand watering plants and bushes in just about half of my yard since the storm. We have only had one day of rain in over two weeks. It's been very dry since two days after the storm. It has also been unusually hot for November the past four days. The weather is predicted to drop back into the low 80's by the end of the week.
The only butterfles that seem to be missing, again, are the Zebra Longwing and Monarchs. I have not seen a single one of either of these two.
The Duranta (Golden Dew Drop) I moved to the North side fence, survived. It's not growing new foliage yet, but that should start soon. My second Duranta (a White Sky Flower) had a tree from a neighboring yard fall on it. It's still growing, but doing so horizantally along the ground.
My generator has kept me in power for the past two plus weeks. It's also kept the yard noisy and smelly (like Napalm in the morning) This may have something to do with the absence of butterflies too.
Art
This message was edited Nov 8, 2005 7:24 AM
An update. Yesterday I was planting seedlings into pots for gifts. I was in the nursery for several hours doing this. Several times while I was working a GF or two came into the nursery, under the shade cloth and began feeding on the few flowers that were there. There were Lantana, red & pink porterweed, non verigated jewels of opar, and some orange/yellow sedium flowers.
Then something really cool happened. I saw a couple of them at different times lay eggs on cork bark passionflower plants. I have 8 or so in different stages of growth, growing on different shelves and a couple on the ground in the nursery. I was amazed, the GF's seemed to be carrying on as though it were the most natural thing in the world to lay eggs on my nursery plants. Although, to me it's a nursery. To them it could be anything, it was however a haven for their eggs.
I won't be planting them anytime soon since I still have a ton of cleaning up to do so it will be fun to watch them develop. This will be my first time that I will watch the process from start to finish.
Art
.. Ahhh Art ..
Don't ya jes luv the 'spayshall' treats that nature bestows, when we're least expecting such !?! ..
- Magpye
I certainly do. It was just what I needed for inspiration to get off my duff and get the place cleaned up.
I just finished cutting up and throwing over the wall, about 1/3 of his egg fruit tree. I was right, my White Sky Flower Duranta is still growing but it needs a good trimming to straighten it out. A Yesterday, today and tomorrow was partially flattened out by the tree too, but by the time I had all the branches thrown over the wall it was almost back to normal. It had lost it's mature leaves but new leaves are already in place. It's due to begin blooming the beginning of December. Perhaps it will still do so.
Another surprise was parsley, fennel and several Spanish Needles bushes were still intact. A little strange looking but intact nonetheless.
I was outside most of the day and only saw GF's, a couple sulphurs and a single white.
In the main nectar area for the butterflies the lantana is blooming nicely and so are the Spicy Jathropa and Bee Balm. Down near the broken utility pole there are three milkweed's doing nicely. I have the area roped off so workers won't step on the milkweed. There are sevaral Cuban Buttercup also in bloom and in that area a few Spanish Needles and wild Poinsetta.
Now that I have power back I will be able to turn on the sprinkler system again. The butterflies always like the sprinklers. Perhaps it will help.
I will keep this thread posted when things happen.
Art
Art, so sorry to hear all that you've been going thru but am glad that you didn't lose everything. And in the middle of all of this, you are potting up gifts? How very nice and unselfish of you! Keep us updated on your progress.
I think I saw a GF laying eggs today. My yard has been covered in Queen's the last 2 days, so hopefully they will leave me some too.
KKB, the "gifts" are terrariums I make from coke or pepsi 2 ltr bottles and 4" pots. Our 5 person SF Galloping Gardeners is hosting a round up this weekend down here at Molly's house (because the parks are still closed.) I put together a bunch of these terrariums with a red mimosa and strongbark seedlings in them. I also labeled them as a souvenir terrariums from our round up. Several of the attendee's will be coming good distances and I wanted their trip to be as memorable as possible.
Posting here helps keep me going. There is a lot of work out in my big yard for an over the hill guy like me. Posting here is like letting off steam after a hard day in the fields.
Actually I am more and more surprised each day at how much of my stuff is coming back quickly. With the dry, hot weather I just didn't expect it to happen so fast.
When the butterflies come back it will really make my day.
Art
They are back. I saw my first Zebra Longwing yesterday morning and two of them this morning. I also have giant swallowtail cats on my Wild Lime.
Today I checked out the milkweed plants again and no cats. The plants are growing nicely so if there are Monarch's in the area they will drop by. The yard is ready for them.
The fennel and parsley have been exposed for a couple of days now but not any action on them.
Roof repairs to the warehouses on my East border that were damaged during Wilma seem to be over and the air smells fresh again. This might make a difference in butterfly action (groping at straws here), but you never can tell what makes the difference in having them or not if you have enough plants they like.
Art