butterfly
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Common Buckeye
Here’s a Common Buckeye butterfly feeding on a Firewheel aka Indian Blanket (Gaillardia pulchella). If you look closely in these next photos, you’ll see a bee as well. They briefly shared the same flower, but I wasn’t able to capture that. Continue reading
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An Abundance Of Firewheels
I have three areas defined in the back yard in which I sowed wildflower seeds last fall, and I am also allowing selected volunteer plants to stay as well. In the front two areas, the predominant plant that has grown is Firewheel aka Indian Blanket (Gaillardia pulchella), which has made a magnificent display and which… Continue reading
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Common Sootywing
I’ve seen a few butterflies here this year so far, but there is not much for them to eat yet. They’re also tricky to photograph as they are flitting around — I usually end up discarding tens of photos just to get one that will do, and sometimes I fail altogether. Anyway, this Common Sootywing… Continue reading
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Skippers On The Gregg’s Mistflower
Gregg’s Mistflower (Conoclinium greggii) grows equally well in Seguin and Houston, and I was already familiar with it when I planted it here. The flowering season is very long, and it is a major butterfly attractor. On this particular lunch-time visit to my pollinator garden, there were at least three butterflies that I could see… Continue reading
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Migrating Butterflies Fattening Up For Their Long Journeys
It was only recently when I learned that migrating butterflies need to increase their fat content in order to have enough fuel to journey south to their wintering sites in Mexico. As delicate as they appear, I hadn’t thought about them having fat at all. Monarch butterfly larvae will only eat Milkweed leaves, but the… Continue reading
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Lunch At The Pollinator Garden
We have a bench in our front porch, which faces east. So this is a favorite place for me to eat afternoon meals if I want shade, or morning meals if I want sun. Even in mid-November, here in USDA Plant Hardiness Zone 9a, there are still plenty of plants in my little pollinator garden… Continue reading
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Finally, A Monarch Butterfly
I help to maintain a pollinator garden in a Seguin park, and one of the team there is a Community Scientist who monitors sightings and activities of Monarch butterflies in the garden. In that garden, there had been zero evidence of Monarch activity all year until a week ago, when we finally saw a caterpillar… Continue reading
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When Wings Look Weird
When I first saw this butterfly on a Sunflower, I thought it was odd that it seemed to have an extra set of wings. A companion on the same plant looked the same, so I concluded that it’s supposed to be that way. iNaturalist told me that this was a “grass” Skipper of some sort… Continue reading
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Southern Skipperling
Since I first noticed a bee visiting the biggest clump of native grasses that I have so far, I have deduced that most of the bee activity in this region is from about dawn to 10am. I have seen — and heard! — as many as 20 bees visiting this small patch at one time.… Continue reading
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A Weary Clouded Skipper
This rather battered Clouded Skipper butterfly was resting on my Desert Willow tree in the morning sun. I didn’t see it feeding, although apparently its favorite flower colors are pink, purple, and white. The open blooms on this tree are a dark pink. Continue reading
About Me
Nature Lover.
Inquisitive Observer.
Student Gardener.
I invite you to join me on my journey to convert my sterile (from a nature point of view) new house lot to a healthy and diverse ecosystem, as I make discoveries, mistakes, and hopefully progress. I am not an expert or professional. The project started in February 2023 and the location is Seguin, Texas, USA.
Rewilding My Lot 