My, How They Are Growing! And Oh My Oh My Joe Pye!!

          When last we left the five bambini, the Black Swallowtail caterpillars on the bronze fennel and the parsley, they were tiny first-stage caterpillars about the size of a grain of rice. In the week since, they have shed their skin twice (and eaten it -- yum!) and grown to over an inch in length, changing their colors in the process. In the photo above, taken Saturday the 13th, the caterpillar on the left has adopted a fixed pose preparing to molt, while the one on the right has just completed its transformation and has turned around and is devouring its old skin (that black stuff on the stem).  
            Below is Priscilla Parsley on Saturday just after she shed her first skin, becoming a second instar. It appears that parsley is more fattening than fennel, as she progressed to the third stage in 36 hours and is the largest of the group. 

              All of them are doing well. We are wary of predators, especially paper wasps, as the caterpillars grow bigger and become more visible and more tempting targets.  Our next blog post will show more of the dangers that butterflies and caterpillars face in the garden. 

Did We Mention a Monarch Female Was Sighted?

             Normally this would be the headline news, as we are longing for some caterpillars to eat our milkweed. We spotted her only as she was leaving and cannot even confirm she was in the garden at all. Ever optimistic, we read this resting pose as post-egglaying fatigue, but who really knows? You can be sure that we will be watching!

And Who Doesn't Like (Joe) Pye?

                    A remarkable native plant, Joe-Pye Weed opens its huge clusters of tiny pink flowers in early August, and for pollinators, it's like Waffle House opened a free all-you-can-eat buffet. Countless varieties of insects and nearly every variety of butterfly from the largest to the smallest jostle and buzz for their share of the nectar. 

          Compare the relative scale of the individual flowers to any of the pollinators above, so that as you look at the image below you can appreciate just how small our smallest butterfly, the tiny Gray Hairstreak, truly is. It could hide comfortably behind a dime. 

            And the lovely Buckeye returned as well, along with an Eastern-Tailed Blue, twice as big as the Hairstreak, opening its wings in the sun and showing the lovely color it often hides. 

Let Us Not Forget All the Action at Other Flowers! Busy There, Too. 

          First up, we have a couple of our favorite yellow butterflies, with the larger Clouded Sulphur on penta (top), and the darting Little Yellow landing on the portulaca.

            A new species for the garden dropped by one morning to warm its wings. Meet the Appalachian Brown, below. 

             Among the many Pipevine, Spicebush, and Eastern Tiger Swallowtails visiting the garden, as many as twenty at once during peaks, there are often aerial dances that the butterflies engage in. Some appear territorial, some may be play, and some are all of the above as nature's instinctual drives take over. Yesterday, four Spicebush butterflies were chasing and dancing and competing all around the garden, before a couple found a spot amid the hydrangea leaves.

              And for the first time this summer, the Tennessee state butterfly, the Zebra Swallowtail, a perfect one at that, graced us with its presence. 

          Thanks for joining us. In closing, here are a couple of fun images of an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail on a zinnia. We remind you to check back soon for caterpillar updates as we have them.