Butterfly and Wildlife Gardening And Photography In Houston Texas
Category Archives: Nectar Plants As best I can tell, we still only have two Ruby Throated Hummingbirds; one male and one female. They just love that Coral Honeysuckle (we have two of them)! It sure would be nice if the male and female hooked up and built a nest in my backyard. I haven’t seen them interact with one…  I had the opportunity to get a closer look at the recent Ruby Throated Hummingbird that has appeared. He definitely is a mature male. It’s the only Ruby Throat we have right now. He LOVES the Coral Honeysuckle plant. If you look close enough at the picture below, you can see his bill covered in…  In between digging up some Bamboo, photographing Wildflowers, and trimming some Milkweed, we had another Eastern Black Swallowtail visit the garden. This particular Butterfly was laying eggs on both the Fennel and Dill. In the past, the Eastern Black Swallowtail would only lay eggs on our Fennel, not the Dill, although that is one of…  For folks outside of Texas, this post might seem a little crazy (since the weather is so cold in other parts of the U.S.), but it is getting close to the time that the Ruby Throated and Rufous Hummingbirds (we’ve never seen Rufous Hummingbirds in our backyard) begin their migration North. Last year we didn’t…  In addition to the Cedar Waxwings behaving in an interesting way, I also witnessed a Monarch Butterfly do something I’ve never seen before. Today, I released one of the Monarchs that eclosed a couple of days ago. The Butterfly got a nice draft of wing, and gently floated to our Maple tree. That’s when it…  Today was a big release day for Monarch Butterflies. We released a total of 6 Monarchs today. We also found a Monarch and Gulf Fritillary feeding on the Mexican Flame Vine. My plan was to place each of the 6 Monarchs on this Cherry Blossom and take a few pictures. Of course that plan failed… 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…  In addition to the Monarchs, the Gulf Fritillary Butterflies are taking advantage of the warm weather and laying eggs and getting nectar from the Trailing Purple Lantana. I’m not sure how long this plant is supposed to stay in bloom, but it is really doing well.  We’ve had a female Queen Butterfly around the last two days getting nectar from the Milkweed and Butterfly Bush Plants. I haven’t seen her lay any eggs yet. This is Leecy’s favorite Butterfly. We’ve also had a female Monarch in the garden and she and the Queen try and chase each other away from the…  I’ve fallen in love! I’m renting my ultimate dream lens, the Canon 500mm f/4. This lens is stunning. I received the lens today mid-morning couldn’t wait to test it out on my Canon 7D. I had just walked out in the backyard noticed a Squirrel. Good enough for me. Then I hear the unmistakable sound…  Painted Lady Butterflies are always a challenge for me to photograph. They rarely sit still for long. The Butterfly Bush had some appeal where we actually had two different Painted Ladies. One particular Butterfly positioned itself in a perfect position against the blue sky.  Poor Butterflies. Today was a beautiful day, but it was a little chilly for Butterflies. I literally saw two Monarchs drop out of the sky. These poor Butterflies were doing all they could to warm up in the sun, but the high was only 68 degrees. They’d be flying around, then that cold North wind…  We had a total of 4 Monarchs hatch today; 3 females and 1 male. The 3 female Monarchs flew away as soon as they were released but the male Monarch stayed for a while on the Purple Coneflower. Of course, life is not easy for a Monarch Butterfly, and while this Butterfly was just trying…  We still had quite a few Butterflies today, but a few less Monarchs than yesterday. The Butterflies that were really abundant today were the Gulf Fritillaries. The Mexican Milkweed appeared to be a popular gathering place for both the Monarchs and the Fritillaries. Sometimes the Fritillaries and Monarchs would share the Milkweed, other times they…  We had Monarchs, Sulphurs, and Long Tailed Skipper Butterflies today. It was a beautiful day outside, not a cloud in the sky. Primarily I was focused on tagging and photographing the Monarchs, but when this Long Tailed Skipper appeared on the Butterfly Bush, I had to get a picture of that! Yea, I know these… |
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