DAILY BUTTERFLIES Page 32

Since Deb is still sick and I'm about to post a whole bunch of pictures...it's time for a new thread! In case you're new to the crowd, we came from here: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/819078/

In case you're wondering about the above photo, that's my first sulphur! It took exactly one week for it to come out of the chrysalis. Mom was taking care of them today while I was at work and she said she saw this odd-looking leaf that upon second glance turned out to be a butterfly! You can definitely tell that the sulphurs have adapted well with their host plants. When they hang from the plant they look like a yellowed leaf, just like their chrysalis!

I'm pretty sure this is a Cloudless Sulphur but if anyone wants to confirm or deny I'd appreciate it. This guy was a little smaller than the ones I usually see, but his chrysalis was small, too. Hmmm... Mom thought the marking on it were interesting; I guess she thought they were all yellow.

This one's not a butterfly but it is yellow. My first daffodil opened! Every year I try and defy the fact that I live in FL by growing daffodils. Some years are better than others, but this one comes up every year about this time. I'm not sure which cultivar it is because it was in one of those mixed groupings.

And here's the latest on my Giant STs. The little one had me worried, but he finally molted this morning and has been eating this evening. The other one got so much bigger so quickly!

Melanie

Mellie...

I can't wait until the fall season to pay you back for gloating over all those butterflies and caterpillars you're getting at this time. Not a one in my yard for weeks!!! Wahhhhh!!!

First it's been horribly windy, then the temperatures drop into the 40 and 50's at night then we get freaky 90 degree weather during the day time! UGH!!! Crazy weather!!!

~ Cat

ps...those sulphurs are such beauties too. Gonna have to plant some senna seeds real soon.

I found a bunch of these Wood Satyrs near my pond this morning, but only one would let me get near enough to take the pix.

Awww...don't be jealous. Since I've been gardening I've learned that part of the fun is having different seasons for things. Not that we have much difference in seasons here, but still...I used to wonder why people would plant things like daffodils because they would only bloom once a year. I still prefer flowers that bloom throughout the year, but I also look forward to seeing my little yellow friends each year.

Love that Satyr! I've only seen the Carolina Satyr. I know they're not the showiest butterflies, but I like their eyespots and the way they blend in with leaves.

In sad news, one of my Giant ST cats died. Does anyone know what it means when you find them laying there in a little pool of liquid? I've lost many swallowtails like that and I'm just wondering if anyone knows what causes that. In happier news, my Zebra ST egg hatched. I'm not getting too attached yet; they have a fairly high mortality rate in the first few instars (like most butterflies).

And for my picture of the day, I was wandering around the yard when I saw what I thought was a moth, but turned out to be a Tropical Checkered Skipper. I usually see more of these guys when I let the Spanish Needles bloom. I also saw a Zebra Longwing fly through the backyard when I was standing by the rain barrel, filling my watering can. Mom reported a large yellow sulphur on the bougainvillea today.

Melanie

Trois...that's a lovely butterfly!!! We don't get those here but we do get Carolina Satyrs and Gemmed Satyrs. They are also hard to photograph as they are constantly flitting around. They won't fly up to bait stations as they tend to be low/ground flyers but they do come to bait that has dripped to the ground though...so sometimes enticing them with that helps.

Mellie...never ceases to amaze me at all the butterflies you're getting this time of year. This strange weather is driving me nuts. It's still windy and supposed to get up into the high 90's if not hit 100 tomorrow. I really need to retire or win the lottery - I miss out on so many butterflies working all day long!!! :o(

~ Cat

Sweet lil Checkered and Sulphur Mellie, & thx for starting the new thread! Glad you guys feel like it's your thread, because it is, and always has been.

Beautiful little Satyr Trois.. I love those. I saw many of the in the Thicket further south. Thanks for posting the pic!

Feeling much better, even put in a day at the Conservatory Monday working the entrance. It was really busy for a Monday. Still organizing the pics and studying all the species before making a thread for them. Sheila and I want to make sure folks know these are exotics and don't want to get them mingled in with the domestics to avoid confusion. I hope to begin entering them in by Friday.

Thanks everyone for bearing with me.

Debnes

Thanks. These are in every small clearing in the brush, usually smaller than 15 feet across. Their color is just about a perfect match for the dead leaves they favor. Now and then one will land on something green making them visible.

Cute butterflies! And some good photos, Ladies! :-)

Melanie - I am hoping to get GST cats this year again. I have seen a few fly-bys in my yard lately. :-)

Deb - Glad to hear that you are doing much better. Hadn't seen you post here and was kinda worried.

T - I hear ya! I wanna hit the lotto too! Soon!!! :-)

Glad you're feeling better Deb! And you're right, this is everybody's thread! That's what makes it so great.

Well, you know butterfly season is in full swing when you start seeing the butterflies downtown. Today was absolutely beautiful so I added a lunchtime walk to my morning and afternoon break walks. I walk around the square across from the county center. It's a little park they use for things like the MLK celebration and they also have a big holiday festival where Mr. and Mrs. Claus come and they have all this fake snow. But normally, it's planted with lots of oak trees in a circle, palm trees, coontie under the palms, and what I think is some kind of jasmine as a ground cover. There's also a big Red Cedar that was donated by Friends of the Park (they also donate the giant Christmas tree each year). Today I saw a Gulf Fritillary (possibly two but it could have been the same one), a sulphur, and one of the little white butterfliesflying around this little square.

My parking lot downtown is basically an open field and when they don't mow for a while all the Spanish Needles come up and flower. That's one of the host plants for the dainty sulphur so they tend to show up a lot. There used to be these big plumbagos in front of the garage across the street, but they cut them to the ground and I'm not sure if or when they'll come back. The butterflies love those plumbagos. It's always nice to know you can support wildlife even in an urban environment.

Melanie

I saw 2 males monarchs again today, battling over nectar rights! Sure wish some females would show up. Also a ZLW.

A coworker found this poor battered moth today, it was on one of the work trucks that was getting ready for some welding. He thought it was dead, and brought it in very carefully, so I could "bring it home and give it a proper burial in the bf garden." How well those guys are trained! Well, about an hour later, I came back into the office and it was fluttering, must have warmed up inside. Its wings are beat up badly, but it can crawl really well! I brought it home at lunch and put it out in the oak tree, its hanging there happily. Maybe it will attract a mate tonight?

How cute is this fuzzy face?

Hard to tell what the wings look like, maybe someone has an idea what it is? Going to www.butterfliesandmoths.org to see what I can see.

Cathy

You're a good moth mommy, Cathy. : )
~Lucy

Thanks Lucy!

I think it may be a Polyphemus moth. It looks like the pic here:
http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/images?l=3290
It was still hanging from the oak branch as the sun set. I checked a little while ago with the flashlight, but I didn't see it. Maybe it found a mate....
The cats do eat oak, we have both Live and Laurel oaks in our yard, so maybe someday we'll have those funky green caterpillars!

Great big moth ya got there SV!!! Glad you rescued it and turned it loose in your yard :o)

~ Cat

Nice work Cathy!! Beautiful Polyphemus!!!

I went back to the preserve today to search for more Zebra Swallowtails. Even though it was raining, I searched for my caterpillar friends anyway. I just carried an umbrella! I found three - well, I found two and one found me. Since everything was wet, I kept getting little pieces of bark and leaves stuck to my hands. I went to brush one off when I noticed it was actually a tiny caterpillar! Here's a look at two of them - I love when they get big enough to "earn their stripes".

I saw this little moth clinging to the underside of a pawpaw leaf and thought you guys might want to see it.

I took another look at the plant all the butterflies and bees were on the other day, and it turns out it's Shiny Blueberry: http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/92692/

I have another sulphur getting ready to come out and Mom and I were staring it. I realized that the head of the butterfly is down by the "point" of the chrysalis. I took a picture of it upside-down so you can see it. Like the swallowtails, the "seam" down the middle is the proboscis. You can see where the two eyes are on either side of the line. The wings are wrapped around it and you can see the segments of the body near the bottom. Hopefully, it will come out tomorrow. I probably won't get to see it though as Mom and I are volunteering to clean up another park with the Tampa Bay Estuary Program. I hope we see some butterflies while we're out there!

Melanie

Wow, where is everybody? Well, we went out to the park today and cleaned up the Hillsborough River. The butterflies were out in force, and I got pictures of all the ones I saw, with the exception of the Dainty Sulphur. They're just too fast and picking up trash for three hours wore me out! Oh, there was a little orange skipper that was too fast for me, as well.

In the past few weeks I've started seeing the Whites in the medians again. I saw what I think was a Checkered White today. I don't usually get near enough to photograph the White butterflies, so I'm not as familiar with them.

This message was edited Mar 15, 2008 2:05 PM

It just wouldn't be FL if a Gulf Fritillary wasn't flying around. Saw one in my yard today, too. Saw a Swallowtail fly through the backyard while talking to Dad (he saw it, too). Couldn't tell which one and none of them have laid eggs on my pipevine either.

And here's a Tropical Checkered Skipper enjoying the Spanish Needles. If you can get any of the plants from the Bidens genus, I would highly recommend them. They're the host for the Dainty Sulphur, but many other butterflies nectar on them. I try to let them grow down by the road; most people here see them as weeds.

And I saw a crescent! For some reason I get really excited when I see these butterflies. Maybe I'm just shocked I actually see the little guys. It was Mom's first time seeing a crescent so she was excited, too.

I didn't think I was going to get a picture of this guy, but he finally settled down. It's Dad's favorite butterfly, the White Peacock. Since their host, bacopa, grows near water, I looked around but I couldn't find any. It could grow on a different section of the river, I suppose. Well, that's the report from Tampa.

Melanie

AHA!!! I'm back in the game :o) Was out taking photos of my boomerang passion vine flowers and didn't notice this big guy in the background until I'd uploaded the photos on my computer. Seems all those weeks when I didn't see a butterfly they must have been frolicking in my yard when I was at work. Guess we can always depend on Gulf Frits to make the rounds :o)

~ Cat



This message was edited Mar 16, 2008 10:09 AM

Here's the big bugger from the other side...sans the camouflage of flowers and leaves.
I also looked around the vine and found another large instar and a smaller second instar. Didn't find any other even on the other passion vines. Would bring these in to raise but will be out of town for a couple of weeks next week. Do hope they stay safe :o)

~ Cat

This message was edited Mar 16, 2008 10:04 AM

Great news! Butterflies are flying around in my yard today. Other than cabbage whites, and the few EBST i've released from over wintering in cages, It's been depressing around here. I finally saw the first Tiger Swallowtail and a blue colored ST, could be a Pipevine! I'm so e x c i t e d! Now if my milkweeds would just hurry up and emerge maybe I could say spring is arriving early this year!

Melanie, Cat, your photos blow me away. I haven't posted in a while because I've been so busy getting my garden ready for spring. I'm doing a lot of seeds, many of which Debnes gave me to attract bf's.

Today I found this beautiful wing on my patio. Can you id him? I haven't yet pulled out the fortune of bf books I bought. This summer I plan to keep a book outside with me at all times for quick reference. Could the bf be a luna moth?

Missed y'all.

Martha

Martha,
It is indeed a Luna. It is the lower wing. Here is a link to read about the host plants and other info. http://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/species?l=3292
Funny my DH took a picture this last year that was on a grate of a chiller looking very simular to the background of yours!

Thanks, Sheila. The grid work -- how coincidental! Actually I found my wing between the concrete and a paver. See below. Oops, skipped the photo.

Martha

This message was edited Mar 17, 2008 8:39 AM

I grow a lot of Moonflowers and get lots of Luna Moths supping on the nectar.

Martha

Welcome back Martha! Spring has definitely sprung!

Mom usually gets all the fun of releasing the butterflies since she works from home, but yesterday I had two sulphurs wait just for me! And they did have to wait a bit because Melanie was tired from all that volunteering and slept in. The one had a little tear in the back of his wing. I had noticed his chrysalis had a little flap that wasn't quite smooth so maybe that was what it was.

Also saw the Tiger ST flying around this weekend!

The other one was ready to go as soon as I opened the lid. I still managed to follow it to its perch on the grass.

So tonight when I pulled in I saw a large sulphur flying around my cassia. It flew away and I walked inside. It was too big to be the one Mom let go today. Then, I was taking the compost pail outside when I had to drop it and run - because an orangish sulphur was laying eggs on my cassia! Do you guys think this is another Cloudless Sulphur or do they not come in orange? All my Cloudless Sulphurs have been bright yellow, but I wasn't sure if it was a seasonal difference.

Ok kids, don't try this at home. I wanted to get a better picture of this sulphur so you guys could help me identify it. So I stealthily waited until it stopped right in front of me to oviposit and then - BAM! Don't worry, she was fine when I let her go. She flew away and probably told all the other sulphurs about her near death experience. I did collect the eggs and they're sitting in here with me. But doesn't it look really orangey for a Cloudless Sulphur?

Melanie

Some Cloudless Sulphurs (Phoebis sennae) are more orange than others. There is a photo of one on our local NABA website.
Look at the second photo: http://www.naba.org/chapters/nabast/cloudlss.html

You might want to compare it to photos of Orange-barred Sulphur (Phoebis philea) and Large Orange Sulphur (Phoebis agarithe).

~ Cat

Wow, she IS really orange. Great picture. : )
~Lucy