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Florida Gardening

Rank beginner butterfly garden success

14 years ago

Basically, I'm posting for all those folks out there like me who don't know what the heck they're doing and rely on a couple of books and GW to slap together a garden in the few hours of spare time they have on the weekend.

Using a flier I got from Lukas Nursery in Oviedo, a free "Waterwise" book from the St. John's Water Mgmt district, and GardenWeb I have created a butterfly garden that, after 18-months of work, has provided me butterflies and caterpillars of gulf fritillaries, zebra longwings, and monarchs. I've got tons of longwings all day long! I also have two giant swallowtail visitors several times a day. Occasional eastern tiger swallowtail, and I think palamedes swallowtail (black and bright blue). Plus one of the small yellow guys (a suphur?).

It's a joy to sit on my porch and watch, and a great nature lesson for my two-year old. AND, I work full-time and travel frequently for work. If I can do it, anyone can!

So, thanks to all for their advice (usually in the form of posts I read 10-months after they were posted), I'm totally hooked to butterfly gardening.

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Comments (10)

imagardener2
14 years ago
Photos! we need photos! Butterflies, butterfly plants, caterpillars, whatever.

Oh and congratulations :-)

Denise
mboston_gw
14 years ago
I'm envious! I don't have nay Zebra Longwings this year! All kinds of others but have only seen an occasional single ZLW and have found no eggs. A few years ago I would be releasing up to 2 dozen a day. Strange how things change each season.

BTW, your bluish Swallowtail could be either a Spicebush or Eastern Black depending on your host plants.
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johnjsr
14 years ago
We try to keep a mix of host plants and nectar plants for the butterflies. Right now I have seeds for aristolachia elegans, the calico flower, a host for the gold rim swallowtail, and caesalpinia pulcherima, known as the dwarf poinciana, a favorite nectar plant for a lot of butterflys. If you plant them, they will come. Send me an email if you want some.
john
manature
14 years ago
Congratulations on your success with your butterfly garden! It is SO rewarding, isn't it? I grow a lot for the butterflies and hummers, too, and I enjoy it so much.

An easy way to tell palamedes from the other swallowtails is by the underside of their wings. They have a yellow stripe running parallel to the body that none of the other black swallowtails have.

This mark is diagnostic and they hold their wings up often enough that it is fairly easy to spot.

Hope this helps!

Hand-raising the caterpillars is one of my favorite things to do. I always try to bring some in each year to be sure they make it.

Enjoy your garden!

Marcia
laura1
14 years ago
I've been gardening for many years but the last few years I've added plants for butterflies and now birdfeeders. Seeing the activity in in garden adds a whole new deminsion! There is nothing like success to keep you motivated and it sounds like you are quite successful! I too envy your Zebra Longwings.
When I was growing that native passion vine with the small greenish flowers (it's a weed!) I had ZLW all over it. I might have to get more of that.
Anywho congratulations on your garden...so exciting.
rowdy13
14 years ago
My first thought for "black and bright blue swallowtail" would be Pipevine Swallowtail. Second would be Black Swallowtail. I would have to include yellow in my description of the Black Swallowtail.

I'm not seeing the hummingbirds I'd like to be seeing in my yard but the butterflies numbers have been amazing. I've got host plants for most of the swallowtails, many of the sulphurs, Gulf Fritilaries and Zebra Heliconias, Monarchs, Cassius Blues, a number of skippers and probably some I'm forgetting or don't realize.

Unfortunately, I've decided to try to completely remove my passion vine since it has gotten completely out of control. It started out in one spot in the yard and now grows throughout the yard as well as in all of my neighbor's yards. The Gulf Fritillaries lay individual yellow eggs anywhere on the vine in sunny areas while the Zebras lay yellow eggs in groups on the tips of the vines in shade.

I've got Calico Flower that is the host for the Polydamus Swallowtail (Gold Rim). Their eggs are yellow and in clumps. I've had Pipevine Swallowtails lay red eggs on this vine but their caterpillars don't survive on it. I've started a Aristolochia tomentosa from seed for the Pipevines.
Other swallowtail plants include various citrus (Giant), Black Cherry (Tigar)(also Red-spotted Purple), Bays (Spicebush), and a couple of fennels and parsleys for the Blacks.

I've got Cassia/Senna bicapsularis, Cassia alata, and a Chapmann's Cassia for the sulphurs. Milkweed for the monarchs. Plumbago for the cassius Blue. Cannas for the Brazilian Skipper. And, various weeds (beans, grasses, fogfruit, beggars lice, bidens, etc.).
mexicostacy
Original Author
14 years ago
Thanks for all the good thoughts! I will get some pictures up this evening. The ZLW and Gulf Frit's are literally all over the place, but the black/blue swallowtail and the other swallowtails only make one or two visits a day. So I don't have any pics of those guys yet. My passionvines aren't doing that great because the ZLW cat's have eaten them down to the nub. I hope they survive the experience. Even though my milkweed were also eaten literally bare, I have nary a monarch. What gives?

John, I'd love some seeds. I'll send you an email for sure, thanks!

Stacy
mexicostacy
Original Author
14 years ago
Here are a few pictures of the butterflies in my garden...

Gulf fritillary on the lantana.

Zebra longwing on the lantana.

Not sure what these two ZLW were doing, but it looked like there was a cocoon in between them.
imagardener2
14 years ago
Thanks for the photos. Nice photography!

I am excited to report 21 black swallowtail cats on my last bronze fennel and 2 dozen black rim cats on the pipevine. What riches. Can't count the fritillaries on the passionflower which is a little out of control right now.

Sulphurs abound but their cats are camouflage experts. Even when I know where they are it takes a long while to see them.
This is last winter when the cassia was in bloom,now the cats are green.
{{gwi:928516}}

Denise
solstice98
14 years ago
I'm so glad it's worked so well for you! Butterflies are the jewelry of the garden and add so much. Most of what I plant is for the b'flies and the hummingbirds.
"Plant it and they will come..."

Kate

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