Butterfly and Wildlife Gardening And Photography In Houston Texas
Category Archives: Eastern Black Swallowtail Today was a great day for Butterfly watching in the backyard (more on that in a later posting). We started off by noticing that one of our 6 month old Eastern Black Swallowtail Chrysalises hatched (is that the correct term?). Right after this Butterfly exited the Chrysalis, we placed it on our Fennel so that…  We had another Eastern Black Swallowtail hatch today after about 6 months in the Chrysalis stage. I took this one out once the sun was out and let it warm up on the Rosemary plant we have. He/She simply opened their wings towards the sun and warmed up a bit before flying off. Traditionally these…  Leecy and I have had this collection of Eastern Black Swallowtail Chrysalises since October 2009. I had previously read that occasionally some of these Butterflies don’t hatch out of their Chrysalises until the following Spring. That seemed like an awful long time for these Butterflies to stay in the Chrysalis stage, but what did I…  Active day today for Butterflies and Honeybees. They tend to fight on the Cigar Bush. We also had two Eastern Black Swallowtails hatch and one Polydamas. The Skippers were lively today as well. Last but not least, there were a couple of young Monarchs flying around. My best shot I’ve ever taken of the Fiery…  Active day in the backyard as the sun finally decided to make an appearance. We went most of the Summer with very little rain, then the past week it’s rained almost every day. The poor Butterflies were probably just “sheltering in place.” Since the sun was out, and things began to warm up, it also…  It’s been raining here since yesterday afternoon. Finally at about 3 the sun came out and the rain disappeared. That also brought out lots of Butterflies. They’ve probably been sheltering under leaves for quite a while. Just in five minutes I was able to count 5 Gulf Fritillary, 4 Monarchs, 1 Pipevine, 1 Polydamas, and…  We’re starting to see an increase in the number of Butterflies we have. One of the Butterfly Caterpillars that we haven’t seen for a while are the Eastern Black Swallowtails. We haven’t seen too many of the adults, but they are making their presence known as our Fennel is really starting to get chewed down…. We haven’t seen any Eastern Black Swallowtails lately. However, today was different. Nearly all the Butterflies we’ve ever seen were floating around the yard somewhere today. The picture below is an Eastern Black Swallowtail laying eggs on the Fennel.  We had a very active Pipevine Swallowtail laying eggs today. As I was watching this Butterfly lay her eggs, I started to get confused about the differences between Polydamas, Pipevine, and Eastern Black Swallowtails. Here are some of the differences and similarities. Polydamas Swallowtails don’t have the “tails” like Eastern Black and Pipevine Swallowtails Pipevine… About those little plastic containers that I use to house some of the Caterpillars (I think they are the “critter cages” sold at Petco). Although these containers are great for housing the Caterpillars, they aren’t so great for hatching Chrysalises. The reason is because once the Chrysalis hatches and the Butterfly emerges, it needs something… You’ve heard me mention about our Butterfly Nursery, but I don’t think I’ve ever shown you any pictures to illustrate was is actually being done until now. Since most Monarchs are off migrating, the majority of the Butterflies we have are the Swallowtails. Their eggs are really tiny, and they tend to be born in… I’ve got a couple of shots of the Eastern Black Swallowtail drinking some nectar from a nearby Butterfly Bush Three Eastern Black Swallowtail Caterpillars, 2 different stages, striking differences (at least to me) We have quite a few Eastern Black Swallowtail Caterpillars growing in our “nursery” right now, probably close to 30. There is such a dramatic difference between when these guys first hatch versus the size they are now. I’d say in about another day or so these guys will go off and form Chrysalises. Oh, one… We’ve had 3 Eastern Black Swallowtails hatch this weekend! These are really beautiful Butterflies. Here’s what’s interesting. The three Butterflies that have hatched have all been the “green” Chrysalis type, not the “brown” Chrysalis type. I can’t recall if I mentioned it before, but there’s some mystery or disagreement about why Eastern Black Swallowtails have… |
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