Pollinators in the garden!
Butterflies took a while to get here after a cold wet winter but boy are they here now. The flowerbeds are on both sides of my driveway so every time I walk to the street I scare up massive clouds of butterflies.
Buckeye on Verbena bonariensis
Tiger Swallowtail on an orange lily
Bumblebees on Monarda 'Raspberry Wine'
Comments (13)
Sabji garden (7b), Raleigh NC
8 years agoUser
8 years agoRelated Discussions
HAVE: Paying it Forward--Pick Ten
Comments (21)Posted by seedmoney 8A (seedmoney@embarqmail.com) on Mon, Feb 18, 13 at 15:45 This offer is now closed. Tip...when responding to any seed trade or 'offer' it is a good idea to scan through the posts in the thread to see if the OP (Original Poster) has updated, changed, or closed the offer...as in this case....See MorePollinators
Comments (8)This year, I planted some cilantro and it produced some very nice flowers that seem to lure - not only honey bees, but small wasps that love the flowers. I'm hoping to harvest a goodly amount of the seeds for drying and use in cooking (coriander). I see very few green worms in my cabbages this year - (but quite a few earwigs - that I missed late in the season - bad me - cuz wrapped up newspaper would have controlled them). I also kept bees in prior years - and they still return to pollinate my fruit trees - and veggies. Several years ago, I planted borage near my fruit-bearing trees to attract them - and have always have had good fruit set since then - as borage re-seeds easily. So - yes, I'm impressed with the cilantro this year and will continue this - have never tried marigolds. Bejay...See Morewill peppers cross pollinate with other garden vegetables
Comments (8)Well, I think they call hot tomatoes, "salsa", and you can make peach, mango and strawberry salsa also. The fruit salsa's taste great with some balsamic vinegar along with the peppers for that kick! All you need is a bowl, a knife, and a spoon to mix it all up! Have fun! Suzi...See MorePlant ID: Returning Pollinator Perennials at Community Garden or Weeds
Comments (7)The photos 6 & 8 both look like butterfly weed, a milkweed with orange or yellow flowers. I agree with floral on all three of her IDs, but want to correct what might be misunderstood. The second photo with rue has a Salvia that looks like culinary sage, but I don’t think that the photos after the number 2 are Salvia. Some general suggestions for posts on this forum: take a photo from the side as well as above if at all possible. only put three or fewer photos per post so we don’t have to keep scrolling up and down between the photos and the comments. You will likely get more responses that way....See More
countrygirlsc, Upstate SC
8 years agolast modified: 8 years agoloisthegardener_nc7b
8 years ago
CasaLester RTP, NC (7b)
8 years agoBlack form of female tiger swallowtail on Lantana camara 'Miss Huff' (available for special trades at the fall Raleigh Swap - swallowtail not included).
Sabji garden (7b), Raleigh NC
8 years agoCasaLester RTP, NC (7b)
8 years agoActias luna - not a pollinator at all (adults don't feed), but otherwise fits well in this thread about cool-looking insects. Adults live no longer than one week, hence are rarely observed although relatively common. Wingspan about 4 in.
Sabji garden (7b), Raleigh NC
8 years agoCasaLester RTP, NC (7b)
7 years agolast modified: 7 years agoOur Aesculus parviflora is adding volume and starting to bloom nicely, and as a native plant it attracts a lot of pollinators.
The problem is that most of these pollinators appear to be carpenter bees.
The shrub was discovered belatedly by swallowtails - when the flowers were already expiring - and a few showed up.
But they were still crowded out by carpenter bees, with whom they had to share.
So here is our moral dilemma: as much as we want to support native pollinators, we don't want to encourage carpenter bees in the neighborhood and if we were to stand by with a vacuum cleaner, we could pick up 10-20 carpenter bees in 10 min.
What does the collective wisdom of the gardening community recommend?
CasaLester RTP, NC (7b)
5 years agolast modified: 5 years agoWhile there are a number of species of black swallowtails, a closer examination of the black butterflies in our area reveals that most of them are not from any of those black species, in particular Papilio polyxenes, Eastern Black Swallowtail, but are indeed a black female form (morph) of the popular Papilio glaucus, Eastern Tiger Swallowtail (seen above in our post from Sep 6, 2015). However, the former must definitely be present here as we just discovered a whole colony of their caterpillars devouring our small shrub of Ruta graveolens:
Unlike the P. glaucus caterpillars, which feed on tree leaves and are well camouflaged, the P. polyxenes caterpillars feed on various aromatic herbs that taste bad to birds and announce this fact with their warning color patterns.karen__w z7 NC
5 years agoTook this series over about a two week period at the end of last month, on one of my agaves.
CasaLester RTP, NC (7b)
5 years agoWe were just talking with Vlad about hummingbird moths and how they like Cleome flowers and this evening we had a wonderful spectacle of two of them feeding on Hedychium coronarium. They are not easy to capture in photos after dusk, but are visible with flash:
trianglejohnOriginal Author