Very lovely, Jim!

Did any of you ever type up a post, add photos and all that and zip away it goes? Must've hit the wrong button or something?

Please Christine and Mellie do take care of those injuries! Most of us, except the BF guru, are no spring chickens. Some of you mentioned the lengths you went thru just to obtain a good shot. I had to crawl underneath a barbed wire fence I couldn't climb over to rescue the Monarch caterpillars on the mowed down milkweeds in the Amish pasture only to nearly land my nose in 4 inches of cow dung! I even recently considered driving my 4th generation Monarchs to the Mexican border next year. Crazy right?
-
So---no more cats...There's only 17 chrysalises left in all stages, the very last straggler pupating last night. Plenty of these last ones were extra fat and have ginormous chrysalises. Each morning I release from 4-7 adults. Below photo is yesterday from my 2nd storey bedroom window A/c unit launch pad. They seem to love taking off and soaring right away!
<--The little darlings seem to enjoy pooping on me.

<<- there's scores of these little Looper type cats on the Passion vines

Guess who came back yesterday? I think it might be the same Buckeye b/c it looks all tattered now



Fritillaries and a Pearly Crescent really congregated on the creeping Heliotrope

That is great Cheryl, you have done a wonderful job with your Monarch cats.

September is Butterfly Month for us. There are three garden locations that seem to attract the most BF, going east, just outside the back door is the Dew Drop Inn. Then, still going east walking through the garage and out the garage's backdoor, Asterville. Then, still east, is another door, actually a gate to the wood fence that gives access to the alley easement. There fruit from one of the pawpaws lands on the ground (not obscured by garden foliage) and there the third group meets.

Grouping observations for September, 2016 -
Of coarse, they're not restricted and cross mingle all the time but, generally

Pawpaws attract certain BF, I guess you could call them the Fruit Eaters. So far I've noted the Red Spotted Purple, Red Admiral, Viceroy, Question Mark, and Comma.
Meanwhile, the Sulphurs, Whites, Pearls, Buckeyes ,Monarchs, and Am Painted Lady prefer the wild New England Asters.
Azures and Skippers like the Dew Drop Inn 'Shapphire Showers'. Hairstreaks, the Dahlia (just outside back door too).



Today -

< (grasshopper bottom ctr) < Whites >

Pearl Crescent -

Red Admiral - flanked by Commas,

Comma -

3 Commas all in a row > (< injured)

Had a few visitors today, the weather has been awful for the past few weeks, lots of rain, hot, humid and just plain uncomfortable. The change from summer to fall is evident-the weather has changed and even though it is still hot-it is not as humid and the temps are starting to come down. I have not seen so many butterflies in my garden in a long time. The Sulphurs are the most difficult to photograph-they won't sit still. They appear to be laying eggs on the Cassia plant. The Monarch appears to be laying eggs on the Plumeria. The Giant Swallowtail was the most accommodating- let me get close and take as many pictures as I wanted.
Anole

Sulphur - Skipper - Comma
- -

Yippee - My wife Linda and I went to Squaw Creek NWR today for Monarch tagging. I so look forward to the final tagging tally. What a BLAST!! Certainly a life time experience. Hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of Monarchs were observed.

One MWSU student came in with one net that had > 30 Monarchs. I personally only netted about 25 (over a 3 hour period) that made it to the collection cage - I easily lost 3 times that.

I observed ~ 20 or so at one time on one Field Thistle. There were other thistle near by that were similarly covered! They also were found in abundance on wild sage and of all things hemp. They were also found in lesser amounts on primarily several types of Aster and Goldenrod.

The tagging was done by ~ 30 people of all ages and took place in the northern most area of North Woods just East of Squaw Creek and South of Rte 118 and the area where we found the most Monarchs was ~ 5 - 10 acres.

Will post some pics later. DW bought a new camera.

Well were gettin so mch attention these days , were on top of the Tithonia !!! and in the Nectar ,.. so the monarch might say .
Today several, here a couple

Those of you who raise caterpillars, can you take a moment to respond to this member's question: The thread "Taking eggs and cats in?" in Gardening for Butterflies, Birds and Bees forum

Seems we're nearing the end of butterfly season here.
Looks like the peacocks are the only ones still there.

And even that Peacock looks pretty worn out!

I goofed again and put butterfly pictures in the Bee Forum.

My apologies and a peace offering...

GrammaChar said:I goofed again and put butterfly pictures in the Bee Forum.

My apologies and a peace offering...






Gorgeous as usual Char... Pipevine SWT ? You are so lucky!! Never saw a wild one yet..waiting for then to find my Pipevines in Yankeeland.

I am pretty sure I saw my first spicebush butterfly the other day.
It's body was spotted and had lighter blue striping then a BST.

Found 2 V. Fritillaries cats and have them in a container with a potted clump of wild violets


and a pic from 2 captive BST feedings ago


think I have 4 chrysalises , 6 more ready to form , 8 or 9 feeding and probably 8 or 9 still feeding in my bishop's weed and lovage plant patches
including a few new smaller ones.

Great caterpillar photos, Kurt! The second one looks like a Caterpillar bouquet!

Cheryl, this grove of liatris seems to be the main draw for the pipeline swallowtails. These fall-blooming plants are great for the migrating butterflies.







Butterflies can assume some strange positions while nectaring, but this was a first for me.

I think the photographer just got a very good angle and beautiful capture Char

now this is a weird position , looks like a crash landing

Peace offerings of male Pipevine Swallowtails are always accepted! FYI, you just caught that one in mid-flap so it looks weird. It happens sometimes.

FYI, Dad kept my Spicebush Swallowtail cat alive while I was gone. I came back to find him in a sling. Dad didn't have to release any butterflies, but I had a male Black Swallowtail late yesterday afternoon.

krobra said:

Found 2 V. Fritillaries cats and have them in a container with a potted clump of wild violets
<---he/she looks a little crinkly Kurt. Is it still doing ok? It got pretty cold here last night!! brrr Some of them are getting ready to overwinter, so it may need leaf litter to hunker down in maybe?. I found mine last year even after a light frost.

GrammaChar said:Great caterpillar photos, Kurt! The second one looks like a Caterpillar bouquet!

Cheryl, this grove of liatris seems to be the main draw for the pipeline swallowtails. These fall-blooming plants are great for the migrating butterflies. I've seen this before--- it's lighter than the type we grow, the blossoms aren't as tight together here and wispier. We don't get them though because there's no naturally growing no Pipevine host plant for hundreds of miles. An adult female PVSWT must wander to find the plants a gardener has installed this far North.

Butterflies can assume some strange positions while nectarine, but this was a first for me.

Oh my! Weird! --- It looks like it sprouted bunny ears!

krobra said:I think the photographer just got a very good angle and beautiful capture Char

now this is a weird position , looks like a crash landing

Reminds me of that old airline joke...lady getting off of the plane politely asked the pilot, "Did we land or were we shot down?"