Butterfly and Wildlife Gardening And Photography In Houston Texas
Category Archives: Passion Vine I’ve mentioned previously that we really haven’t seen many Gulf Fritillary Butterflies this year. I still think the drought has something to do with that. However, while I was out photographing the Monarch Butterflies, I noticed a smaller Butterfly chasing the Monarchs. It turns out it was a Gulf Fritillary. I’m assuming this one is…  Before this year and the drought we have experienced, one of the most common Butterflies we had in the backyard was the Gulf Fritillary. That has not been the case this year. We have seen very few and as a result our Passion Vine is taking over one area of the garden (from the lack… I don’t have any pictures to share tonight but I thought I’d provide an update on our Butterfly Garden, particularly with the Monarchs. Strangely enough, we have quite a few Monarch Butterflies right now. We’ve been releasing 1-2 Monarchs per day for the last couple of weeks. In a way, this makes some sense. In…  I got a big surprise today. I went outside to see if there were any Butterflies flying around. I noticed a Gulf Fritillary flying nearby the Passion Vine so I went to investigate. Holy Cow! There were tons of Gulf Fritillary Caterpillars all over the Passion Vine. I’d guess there were 50 or more. I’ve…  Saw a couple of Gulf Fritillaries flying around today and managed to get a picture with the Butterfly in flight.  This guy looks pretty threatening to me. It’s some type of Ant (obviously), but I’m not sure what kind. He was just sitting on one of the Passionvine stems, like waiting to ambush something that would happen to come by. Notice the little hairs on it’s head?  I saw 3 of these yesterday. That’s more than I’ve ever seen in the backyard. Two of them would chase each other, while the other just laid eggs. This might be one of the better pictures I’ve taken of a Variegated as she rested on a rock right in front of me.  Holy Cow! Today there were Butterflies everywhere in the backyard. We had a Monarch, Question Mark, Variegated Fritillary, Giant Swallowtail, Gray Hairstreak, Eastern Black Swallowtail, some type of Crescent Butterfly, and a Pipevine Swallowtail. I got a few pictures, but I missed several and several others weren’t that good as I got over-excited. The plants…  This is a first. We’ve had tons of Gulf Fritillaries in previous years, but never have we seen a Variegated Fritillary in our backyard, and certainly not one that was laying eggs. Hopefully she laid quite a few eggs as I would really love to see these Caterpillars mature so I can get some pictures…  I really love the flowers on the Passionvine (or is it Passion Vine?). Our single Passionvine is growing all over the place behind the pool and is just now starting to bloom. It’s also starting to attract the Fritillaries. I’m not sure if you can see it from this post, but on one of the… I thought I would put together some brief videos on how to create a successful Butterfly Garden for my last day of vacation. There are a total of 5 videos, each one is less than 2 minutes long. Watching these should give you a decent idea of how to start (or continue) a successful Butterfly…  After the dreary, rainy day we had yesterday, it was a welcome sight to have nothing but sunshine and blue skies today. The beautiful weather also brought out all the Butterflies. It also brought out the “territorialness” in all the male Butterflies. Probably the most aggressive was this male Monarch pictured below. He would rest… I’ve got an interesting picture for y’all. In the early summer we had lots of little Lizards (Anoles). Now it seems as most of those Lizards have grown up and become big and fat. Check out these photos of a Lizard stalking some prey. Hmm, possible dinner? Guess this wasp won’t become dinner tonight. Although we’re not seeing any Fritillaries right now, that hasn’t stopped our Passion Vine from flowering like crazy. Here’s a close up shot of one of the flowers. Probably one of the strangest looking flowers there is. If you click on the picture, you can even see the pollen on the flower. Our Passionvine is growing all over the place, like up the Queen Palm, on the Bamboo, across the Milkweed, etc. However, that doesn’t mean that a Gulf Fritillary really cares all that much where the plant is growing, or even if it is growing. Here’s the story. I was cutting some Passionvine to bring inside… |
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