Not Just Straws: My New Understanding of How Butterflies Eat

A few years ago, on one of my first blog posts about butterflies, a commenter asked me whether butterflies that ate mostly nectar had different mouthparts than did butterflies that preferred rotting fruit. At the time I didn’t know for sure, and all the information I could find did not differentiate between species. So I said I thought they all were pretty much the same. In fact it was pretty difficult to find images showing the mouthparts of different butterflies... Until now!

Last month I was delighted to find a blog post on this very subject. It turns out I was wrong, the mouthparts do vary depending on a butterfly’s preferred food source.

I already knew that a butterfly eats through its proboscis, a coiled up tube that is actually made from two mouthparts fused together. The generally accepted way that a proboscis works is like a straw, to suck up liquid.

However, sipping liquid through the straw is not the only thing going on. In fact, it turns out butterflies also have little sponge-like tissues, called legulae, at the end of the proboscis that allow them to absorb nutrients from mud or other sources that aren’t already liquid. It’s this sponge that varies between nectar eaters like Tiger Swallowtails, and non-nectar eaters like Commas.

Even a butterfly that frequents flowers, like this Tiger Swallowtail, can also absorb salts and minerals from mud by using the legulae at the tip of its proboscis.

This Eastern Comma, on the other hand, never visits flowers at all. It has different legulae to absorb minerals from rotting fruit and dung as well as mud.

In fact, some butterflies even eat blood. A friend of mine once watched butterflies flock to the open wound on a dying turtle, and told me how horrific she found it to see these graceful creatures take life from the turtle in its last moments! Yikes.

So, Hannah, I finally found the answer to your question. Butterflies do have different mouthparts depending on what they like to eat. I’m sorry I couldn’t find this in time to be relevant for you, but perhaps you’re still out there looking for the answer. In that case, please go over to Ask An Entomologist  to see some amazing microscopic photographs of different mouthparts. The original paper is also located here if you want to check that out too.

I love learning new things, even if I get proved wrong in the process!

Handmade gift idea: Pretty Seed Packets from your Garden

Seed packets I made for my friend's birthday recently

If you garden, and you have gardening friends, you probably trade seeds from time to time. Wait, you don’t? You really should try it. I’m not just talking about leftover seeds from packets you bought, but also seeds you gathered from your own garden.

I’m only just getting into seed gathering and seed saving. I haven’t yet braved a big seed swap event like the Washington Gardener Seed Exchange, but I have started sharing seeds with my friends. In fact, seeds from your very own garden can make a pretty awesome present. My friends Jon and Hannah recently moved to a house with a great big sunny back yard, and have grand plans for gardening. So when Hannah asked for gardening supplies for her birthday, I knew exactly what I wanted to give her.

She’s really into rainbows, so I actually already had some pretty rainbow scrapbooking paper purchased for her. When I bought it I didn’t know how I’d use it, just that I wanted to make something for her birthday.

Rainbow!

I had five kinds of seeds I wanted to share with her. All were easy to grow and I know they grow well in our area. This was important since she’s a relative beginner in terms of gardening. I always have tons of dill seed every year, plus I gathered marigold, basil, oregano, and echinacea seeds. These have all reseeded before so I know they'll grow true from seed. (Not all plants you may buy will.) 

I turned to a few of my favorite regional gardening books to research planting information. For each kind of seed I wanted to explain how and when to plant, what to expect in terms of size and spacing, and also benefits I know of from my experience. For example, letting basil go to flower attracts tons of butterflies and bees, as do the purple flowers of oregano. Dill of course feeds Black Swallowtail caterpillars, so I wanted to suggest she plant extra to share with the caterpillars.

This Black Swallowtail caterpillar is eating carrot greens, which are related to dill.

Originally I’d hoped to hand-write all the planting notes, but I had too much information for each seed. I typed them up instead, leaving plenty of room for hand-drawn illustrations. I experimented with different label sizes until deciding that about 4x4” was right.

Once I knew how big my labels would be I could make the packets. I wanted some of the paper to show around the label so I created a template for 5x5” packets. In order to make a tidy seal I also allowed for ¼” extra on either side of the first 5”, plus a ½” flap on top. So this meant I cut out rectangles that were 5½” x 10½”, then trimmed off some of the side, like this:

I folded and glued the packets shut, leaving open the top flap. While those dried I drew illustrations of each plant on the respective labels. I’m not a terribly good artist but that wasn’t the point, I just wanted to get something close enough to be recognizable and also colorful. Seed catalogs with pretty pictures are always more fun and inspiring to read, so I wanted to make sure my seed packets would convey the same sense of “Ooh, I want to plant that!” I made sure to illustrate a Black Swallowtail caterpillar on the dill packet too, so she knows what to look for.

Not the best drawing of a BST caterpillar, but probably recognizable!

Next I put generous amounts of seed in each packet and glued the labels on. I added little dessicant packets when I remembered to do so; again this wasn’t crucial since I expect the seed will be planted very soon.

I glued the top flaps shut and let them air dry. When we were ready to go I decorated the bundle with some gold starry tinsel and tucked it into a gift bag with a pair of colorful gardening gloves.

Hannah was very happy to receive the seeds. Jon is also excited to use the herbs in his cooking. I hope they grow well for her! I’ve offered to help break ground for the new bed or give other advice this summer. Since I work in the horticultural resource library at Brookside Gardens, if she has any questions I can’t answer from experience, I can certainly find plenty of answers at work!

I love to spread garden inspiration to my friends and neighbors. I especially have fond memories of helping my parents garden when I was small, so I hope my friends’ children enjoy helping in the garden too. I look forward to spending time in the gardens this summer on my own as well as with my friends.

A Garden Experiment: expanding my butterfly garden

I hope to see more butterflies like this Painted Lady in my yard this year!

This fall I decided I just didn’t have enough area in my yard devoted to butterfly beds. Some of this was inspired by the great gardens I observed on my Big Year excursions, especially the enormous field of zinnias at the Dismal Swamp welcome center in North Carolina. I didn’t have nearly as many butterflies in my yard as were at the zinnia field, nor did I have the diversity of insects that those zinnias attracted. So I decided to add a few beds devoted to flowers for my butterflies and other pollinators.

I spotted this assassin bug feasting on an unlucky honeybee at the Dismal Swamp rest stop's zinnia field. Cool!

I also decided to try an experiment in creating these new beds. Instead of laboriously digging up the existing sod (since these beds were going to replace some lawn in my front yard), I laid out a layer of flattened cardboard boxes on top of the existing grass, wetted them down, then covered them with a few inches of mulch. I had just enough mulch left over from earlier in the summer to cover both new beds, whew!  I left that there all winter to smother the lawn underneath. Mulching them kept them looking neat and tidy, important since they’re in my front yard. Next I’ll layer some dry leaves and mostly-finished compost on top. I’ll probably add some additional soil too, depending on how much compost I have available. Leaving the cardboard in place under these beds should help control weeds in my new flowerbeds, and it will eventually decompose completely.

Here are the new beds in the fall. Soon it will be time to add more layers of soil and compost, then add my plants!

I’ve started seeds for butterflyweed (asclepias tuberosa), pentas, and verbena bonariensis already. I also purchased zinnia seeds, which are direct-sow. I usually like to focus on native plants in my ornamental beds, but am willing to grow non-natives if they are particularly attractive to butterflies & other pollinators. I noticed verbena bonariensis was very popular with butterflies and hummingbird moths at Brookside Gardens, so thought I’d try it. The pentas are also quite popular with butterflies in the Wings of Fancy butterfly exhibit, so I thought I’d see if my wild butterflies like them too.

Southern Broken-dash enjoying Verbena bonariensis.

I’ve learned a lot more about butterfly gardening since I started here at this house. I’ve learned that butterflies are very nearsighted and really need big swaths of blooms to attract them, rather than one plant here & there. So I’m only planning a few kinds of flowers in those beds. Lots of bright attractive blossoms during the main part of the summer is my central goal here.

With the butterflyweed I hope also to attract egg-laying Monarch butterflies. It would be really fun to add Monarch caterpillars to my invertebrate menagerie in the summertime! Even if I don’t get caterpillars, the bright orange flowers should attract plenty of hungry bees and butterflies. I think this is my third or fourth time trying milkweed; all the previous times I direct-sowed in the fall and didn’t get any sprouts in the spring. So this time I’m raising the seedlings indoors where I can protect them better. If the first batch of seedlings fails I have more seeds and will try again. The tiny new sprouts look healthy so far, though, so I am feeling optimistic.

Baby butterflyweed with their first real leaves! Also marigold seedlings in the back.

What about you? Are you growing anything new this year, or trying a new technique? It’s fun to experiment in the garden. I’m trying a few new plants in my vegetable garden this year as well; I’ll write about that more in a future post.

Happy gardening! Spring is a mere week away.