Terpsichore

Brigitte named our presumably last Black Swallowtail this season Terpsichore—quite intuitively, I might add, because she’d forgotten how to tell a female from a male of this species, Papilio polyxenes. But she’d picked right. Terpsichore is a lady. The distinctive markings here are the white, indeed almost yellow, spots on the wings, tails, and the rear of the body and the distinctive and rather large blue markings on the tail reading up to the “eyes.”

The males, by contrast, shown on the left, have much more pronounced and more yellow markings; the blue spots, however, are quite small.

We found Terpsichore on some parsley we’d grown. The parsley was right next to a veritable forest of dill, which Black Swallowtails evidently prefer; but they like parsley as well. Brigitte had asked for a bunch for cooking. She had it in a glass jar on the windowsill awaiting the time for its use. And there, reaching for them, she noticed with delight that a caterpillar had grown large enough to detect. This was about the end of September—in a way quite late. We wondered if the butterfly would develop this season or whether, as we’d experienced at the old house with another late batch, it would wait until Spring to emerge from its pupa once she had formed it.

We’d had an earlier batch of Swallowtail this summer, but what with my deepening laziness, and its consequence of avoiding the LABORS of blogging, no note of those creature came to be written. Two of their names were Castor and Pollux; the third one, perhaps disliking “foreign” names, managed to crawl out of the box and disappeared before it was time to curl up for transformation.

Mind you, we now have a quite respectable stand of milkweed plants. But no Monarchs deigned to leave offspring at our new Butterfly Ranch. Good thing too. Distinguishing between male and female Monarch is much, much more difficult. Someday, perhaps, I’ll have a chance to address the subject…

Fruits of the Season

The tomatoes come from our garden, the earliest. The peaches come from Monique's tree--way over on the other side of the metro area. We also saw, yesterday, the arrival of two Black Swallowtail males, named Max and Moritz. They were the eleventh and twelfth of our "production" this year--and the thirteenth, not yet named, will probably break from its chrysalis tomorrow. Moritz is resting on the leaf of our hydrangea brush. He dried his wings on that leaf for better than an hour, having flown there from our outdoor metal table. Then, finally, deep sigh, out into the world...

Dido and Aeneas

Of some thirteen eggs deposited on our dill plants early this butterfly season, six survived to form their pupae. Of these four had taken flight as of yesterday morning. Brigitte named the two still in chrysalis Dido and Aeneas. We took Aeneas across the Metro to Monique and John’s domain, thus paralleling Aeneas own travel from Troy to North Africa. Dido emerged yesterday morning—and luckily for us was indeed a female. I bring her image here. She was quite large and flew off in the already well-established and, one might say, blessed northerly direction.

Butterflies, fortunately, have not as yet reached the exalted stages of existence where the conquest of great cities, murder, suicide, tragedy, and high poetic drama play any role at all. Dido therefore is safe. Indeed she was a splendid specimen, quite large, and fluttered off with great energy. Brigitte’s naming strategy, by contrast—drawn from Greek and Roman culture—and their latterday operatic re-celebrations—caused me to have to look up who Dido actually was, and this despite having dipped a little into Virgil’s Aenead. A dip is all it has turned out to be and may remain so. I’m coming around to the view that butterflies may be on a culturally much more exalted level then the Greeks and Romans were. As for Aeneas, he is still in his chrysalis and will be the last to go.

Palatial Birthing Chamber

The mysterious-looking image we present here is the covered cradle for five Black Swallowtail butterflies. Four of them are survivors of twelve!! eggs deposited by an early visitor to our butterfly ranch late in May. It laid its eggs on a quite small dill plant which, itself, had grown in the crack of our driveway but had been replanted in a pot. These four have now settled down and are about to develop their chrysalides. A Swallowtail Mom deposited the fifth one on another dill plant, of our own planting, later; it has a ways to go yet.

Each new year adds to our understanding—and lengthens the season. We’ve already dispatched two butterflies in May. They had spent all winter hibernating in our garage. We now know that the active season extends from early May to late September—when the last-laid eggs mature into caterpillars that form their chrysalides to sail through the winter frosts. We’ve already experienced raising multiple swallowtails simultaneously, but raising four from the same batch is something new. Meanwhile—and we noted this already last season—the Monarch is going through some difficult times. They are said to suffer from climate change and excessive use of pesticides. We saw very few of them last summer and, to date, only a single one so far. No chemicals are used here, at Rancho Mariposa, to be sure. And we even planted milkweed last year to send Monarchs a signal. No takers. Our advertising campaign needs a little work.

Seasonal Notes

Unusual early warmth last year, an unusual cold spell in 2013, has caused us to spend at least a month marveling at Nature’s variability.  Last year everything began to bloom late in March already; this year the same process began late in April. Spring 2013, however, also brings multiple new phenomena to our late-blooming backyard garden. One of them, already touched upon in the last posting, is that two Black Swallowtail butterflies spent a full seven months and two weeks as chrysalides and then, early this month, both emerged. We were, of course, unsure what gender they were, individually or severally. Brigitte had named them Castor and Pollux. When Castor emerged we took her to be a lady, but learning (certainly at our age), is sometimes missy. It turns out that Black Swallowtails with yellow markings are male; those with white markings female. We had to look up this distinction again. Castor and Pollux, it turned out had been rightly named. Both were males; Pollux arrived on May 5. I show him resting on the same forsythia bush as his earlier and much more energetic brother. Pollux spent hours on that bush before himself taking off—and flying in a contrary direction, the first of many ever to do so; he flew South.

Our quince bush produced voluminous red flowers this spring. They appear at the bottom of the bush rather than at the tip of the branches. We are still investigating what manner of adaptation that represents. And our lilac bush, which is now observing its third spring, finally shows very energetic signs of actually producing flowers—and in volume. Those I will show some other time.

Hibernating?

Learned today that Black Swallowtails do not migrate to warmer climes as the Monarchs do. They over-winter as chrysalides instead—and much more rarely as caterpillars.

The butterfly in chrysalis stage can evidently detects the season from a combination of the temperature and the length of the daylight; it then knows what is coming and begins to prepare. In that process it generates a kind of anti-freeze; the chemical protects it for the duration. If it is still a caterpillar, one source informs me, it will burrow a deep hole and, within that, wrap itself into a leaf. I think we witnessed such a case late last fall when a fairly large caterpillar simply disappeared; but we knew too little. Its feeding plants were then in a large pot full of earth, and it may have buried itself. That pot went outdoors for the winter.

Two quite cold nights—with our furnace coming on—sent me on this investigation. We have two candidates for over-wintering. Brigitte has named them Castor and Pollux (although they might well be Castoria and Polluxina). They formed their chrysalides on September 14 and 16 respectively. We shall see. For starters, I took their container out into the cold this morning lest they be deceived.

Oklahoma: Smart People

It surprised me to learn today that only 29 of the 50 states in our United States have officially designated butterflies, indeed only 43 of 50 have officially designated insects—and Michigan is not on either list (ht Brigitte). Well, turns out, that Michigan is trying. An Oakland County web site tells us that the state insect is the Green Darner Dragon Fly, but that’s only unofficially. Now in our opinion any legislature so focused on tax cutting and levying fees that it has no time to designate a State Insect by majority vote needs drumming out of office. Around this household we know what is important!

We salute the smart people of Oklahoma for selecting the Black Swallowtail Butterfly, the star of Rancho Mariposa, as its state butterfly—and the European Honey Bee as its state insect. Not all participating states do—but some have both. Oklahoma has gone the whole nine yards.

Got to wondering about places where places where we have lived. Missouri, Kansas, Virginia, Minnesota, and now Michigan. Missouri and Kansas both have state insects, the European Honey Bee. Virginia, another smart state, has a Swallowtail too, but it is the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail. Minnesota opts for the Monarch. The Monarch, incidentally, rules! It is the state butterfly of Alabama, Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, Texas, Vermont, and West Virginia. The hands-down winner among the insects? The European Honey Bee: Arkansas, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wyoming: The United States of Honey Bee!

Can’t this man get off this fluttering subject already? Impossible, dear friends. We have lots of butterflies now. Two Monarchs came to the Rancho just yesterday to partake of the nectar of our Japanese Knotweed, a kind of bamboo—not counting dozens of Fiery Skippers and our regulars, the Small White Cabbage. The knotweed is now in full bloom, and its high branches and white blooms were aswarm with the winners of this morning’s state competition: Monarchs and Bees.

And then, last night, my eyes just casually brushing some small fennel plants, I detected our tenth caterpillar of the year astride one of its slender green stems. It looks like another Swallowtail hoping to be born here so that it can flutter off to where it really belongs—Oklahoma. Unless our efforts here result in the designation of the Black Swallowtail as the official Michigan State Butterfly. Dream on. Dream on.

The images in sequence: the European Honey Bee, state insect of seventeen states; the Monarch Butterfly, state butterfly of eight states; Oklahoma's Black Swallowtail; Virginia's Tiger Swallowtail; and Michigan's "unofficial" state insect, the Green Darner Dragon Fly. Here some links: State insect web site, State butterfly web site; and Michigan State symbols. The images shown were taken from these.

The Last of the Season?

This year here at Rancho Mariposa we have raised nine Black Swallowtail butterflies. Of those nine two passed away soon after shedding their chrysalis—in both cases the problem was a defective right wing. (Is Mother Nature signaling something?) The last one appeared this morning, a very healthy and very big lady. And she was really ready to head north; they always head north, until, I suppose, the migration period to the south sets in. I’d barely begun to take some photographs when she just took off.

So the raising season is over, but new visitors continue to arrive. Today I took some pictures of the Fiery Skipper. Several were taking an interest in our overflowing mint plantation. More on that subject later. Should other butterflies ask, you can tell them that the Rancho is still open, and the dining is free. The year's final report will be presented after the first frost.

Papilio Polyxenes

Yesterday was a butterfly day—underlined. Discovering the name of the Monarch, with invaluable expert help from Brandon Watson, coincided with the emergence of two of six Black Swallowtail butterflies from their chrysalidae early in the morning. These creatures take several hours to become flight-ready. They spend this time sitting about, moving their wings, holding them wide open, drying them. At distant intervals they also crawl around a little and attempt small—and I mean small— little flights. It was a humid, rainy day yesterday; the drying process took extra time. Herewith selected images:

On top is the lady who emerged first. We took out the large container where she had emerged and she sort of fell, awkwardly, to the iron table outdoors. There she did some crawling about. Next, she flew to the hydrangea bush and remained there for another couple of hours before heading North. How do they know the direction in which, at this time of year, they are supposed to go?

On the bottom is Lady Number Two. The first image shows her mere minutes after emergence still clinging to the pupa from which she had struggled free. Eventually, by the same sequence of steps, she also made it to the same bush and, from there, also headed toward Canada.

Four others are still in pupa stage. One of the four is visible in the bottom left photo clinging to a stem at around 11:00 o’clock. It will take about a week more before they begin to emerge.

Butterfly Update

Herewith our second Black Swallowtail butterfly of the 2012 season. We’ve learned how to tell the boys from the girls, and this is a lady. We now realize that we've yet to see a male. Their wings, seen from the back, are a bright pattern of yellow and black. Ours are mostly black from that perspective—except for the tell-tale markings, not least “eyes” at the tail.

The first image shows the lady just some minutes after she emerged from her chrysalis. She spent about three hours drying her wings and testing her ability to fly. She had affixed her pupa to the screen as well and hence, presumably, felt comfortable in this odd posture. In the second I show her with her wings spread, still in our sun room.

Here, finally, I show her literally seconds before her first solo flight into nature actually began—from a kind of little basket Brigitte had used to collect her from the window sill to bring her out of doors. As all the butterflies we've nurtured so this, the Second Lady of the Spring, also headed straight north.

Now for something different. We discovered, yesterday morning, three new larvae of this species on two different dill plants. They are at their earliest stage and hence virtually impossible to see. At this stage their coloration is brown, with a white spot in the center. Very rapidly they turn black—except for that spot, of course. To illustrate the tiny size of the creature, I will show in succession the dill plant (an arrow marks the area where one larva lurks), the portion of the plant where I saw it, and last, the enlargement of the area itself.

We’ve learned today that Monarchs are as partial to milkweed as Black Swallowtails are to dill. Expanding our view, we’re about to acquire some milkweed. Both of my cameras were on strike when the First Lady of Spring arrived. Our neighbor caught some images, and those may yet be shown.

Caterpillars Have Personalities

Update 2 in butterfly raising 2012. In an earlier post we reported on three Black Swallowtail caterpillars that Spring brought to our tentatively named Rancho Mariposa. One became bird food. When we noticed its loss, we brought the other two inside. Very soon they began what is known in the business as the wandering phase. At this stage the caterpillars become very active. In part their incessant climbing, stretching, and exploration is intended to push what remaining wastes are in them out. In part they are trying to find the perfect perch to rest and form their hard pupae. One of our two survivors behaved with fitting decorum. It crawled about using the dill plants and multiple convenient sticks the Rancho provided for it. The other one?

Well, the other one was insistently adventurous. It managed to reach the rim of the pot several times—and twice it dropped down to the table below. Each time Brigitte returned it to the pot again. Then we were out of the house for a while. On returning, Extrovert had entirely disappeared. A great search ensued, but we couldn’t find it. A day later we discovered it hanging from the screen of a sunroom window. It had managed to overcome endless obstacles and to travel a long distances, ever heading, evidently, for more light. It was so firmly attached to the screen, we couldn’t remove it. And then, two days later, both Introvert and Extrovert turned into pupae over-night. Caterpillars must have personalities.

Clicking on the images enlarges them, Esc returns to the post. In the first image the fine tendrils these creatures use to suspend themselves from the branch that holds them are sharply visible.

Rancho Mariposa

Yes, our Butterfly Ranch is open for business in 2012. We started in April with Brigitte nurturing our first almost imperceptibly tiny dill plants. We added another purchased plant later. No sooner did we have these out of doors than we observed one Black Swallowtail visiting them one morning—hovering, flying away, hovering some more, and this for about twenty minutes. Then, about a week ago, Brigitte discovered the first tiny caterpillar on the purchased dill; it was still black in coloration with a single yellow marker in the middle.  The day before yesterday she saw another on the home-grown plants as well—quite a distance from the first, and yesterday, in the same location, a third. Herewith the first and the other two:

Click to enlarge, Esc to return.

The Black Swallowtails are obviously fond of this location or the dill—although we’ve seen several other species as well. But the others just come to visit, not to deposit progeny.

October Butterfly?

Have we mentioned Zeno yet? I think not. We’re almost too shy to confess that Black Swallowtail butterflies seem to have zeroed (or is it zenoed) in on us.

As October began unfolding, Brigitte discovered yet another tiny tiny late-season caterpillar on the last lonely dill plant out of doors. She promptly recreated the summer’s environment in our sun room again, and the little black thing, with but a token yellow spot to hint at future color-wonders, has meanwhile grown to full size. Let me just hide the dramas that soon unfurled around Zeno, as Brigitte named this creature. Someday we might tell you about Zeno’s altogether surprising ways of living, not least about his or her mysterious disappearances and such. We’ve almost solved the mystery, but there is still a bit of doubt left to overcome. For now, shyly, we present a picture of our October Butterfly to be. When? Maybe before November comes. Or maybe when the first snow falls.

Our Last Butterfly Takes Off

The late one, the fifth Black Swallowtail we’ve managed to raise this summer, broke from her pupa today—and took off. The time was exactly noon. The glass jar, read “the hospital,” is the same one that travelled with us to Traverse City. The video lasts for one-and-a-half minutes and will not win any prizes, but here it is, for the record.

A Day of Butterflies

Four of our five Black Swallowtail butterflies have hatched, migrated outside, eventually into the air, and away... One came last night, three hatched rapidly this morning. Above pictures of them still indoors. The last image is that of an empty husk with but a faintly perceptible slit through which these winged creatures first force themselves into the daylight. One of them, sure enough injured a wing—and gave us some worries for a while.

The migration continued outdoors. The one on the concrete was the first out, last night, and spent his night under a stool in a great down-pour. This morning it was time to dry up. Once dry, they all proceeded to take little trial flights--first to the top of flowers, then to the fenced tomatoe yard, finally into the heights. The last photo shows our last Swallowtail, indeed the one with the injured wing, way up high on a leaf. He rested there for some hours and eventually also flew away.

So does this mean that our butterflies days are over for the year—aside from the last, the fifth, still in chrysalis and a couple more weeks to go? By no means. Around 10 in the morning came a NEW KIND. It stayed for several hours feasting on the blue flowers of our basil plants. Heavy research soon yielded its name. It was a Junonea coenia, better known as a Buckeye—and in the politically insensitive word of nomenclature, sometimes rendered as the Common Buckeye. Not common for us, let me tell you! So long did that Buckeye linger here, we wonder if another campaign may be in the offing. We already know that Buckeye’s caterpillars are very, very black. We shall be inspecting the basil plants daily soon, on the lookout. Herewith some views of this first-time visitor:

We’ve had to use small pictures here to show a good many, hence detail is not immediately visible. But clicking on the images will enlarge them very nicely.

The First Black Swallowtail

As reported before we left, and again this morning, we’ve had the Black Swallowtail pupae with us in Traverse City in a little fishtank. We arrived home late last night, and as already documented, Brigitte released the pupae again and installed them high above some old parsley plants still riding their chosen sticks.

Then, for good measure, Brigitte affixed a huge (from their perspective) plastic butterfly to the window by means of a suction cup. She’d bought the object in Suttons Bay, just north of where we’d stayed. Brigitte thought this “graven image” might “encourage” her charges. Here is Brigitte “archetype”:

Tonight, to our astonishment, the first Black Swallowtail, by coloration a little boy, sliced itself a very narrow opening in its pupa and came out. Brigitte came screaming to get me, and here is a good picture of the new arrival as seen from the side, wings closed, in other words. Meanwhile we’d moved the tray to a more central place in the sunroom. Here he is:

An hour or two later our friend took flight—but only temporarily. At first he crashed against a wall in an unhappy attempt to plunge himself into a lamp. He crawled up the leg of a stool. Brigitte put the stool on the table and took this photo of our friend. Notice that his wings are now half-open.

There the new-born sat for a while, calming down. But the light was still drawing him ever on, ever on. Taking wing again, he landed (happily for the photographer) on the rim of the lampshade and, exhausted from this effort, rested with wings completely opene:

And that was also—probably—the last we shall see of Aristo One of 2011. He took wing again, fell once more, and once more climbed up the leg of the stool. We then decided that we’d set him free—and took the stool out into the night. Good-bye, young one. You’re back in your element again. A happy, happy flight to you in your brief but splendid, fascinating life...

And the two of us came in again, bent over from all of the tensions of the night...