Milkweed Madness

I've shown you a little of what goes on in the cultivated flower beds. Well, out in the meadow, which is just impossibly rich and diverse, it's a party all the time. If I had nothing else to do I'd be out there with my camera most mornings.

 The butterfly weed Asclepias tuberosa  was fabulous this year. It loved the extra rain, and it loves the way Bill mows around the thickest patches with the old tractor.

 Great spangled fritillaries think it's keen. It was overall a very light butterfly year here...many fewer individuals and low diversity in comparison to most years. I've heard as much from many friends.  Lots of rain early on may have suppressed hatching. I don't know. I just know there aren't as many butterflies around as there ought to be. It usually looks like a scene from Snow White around here.

It helps having butterflies' favorite flowers. Common milkweed A. syriaca is just irresistible. It, along with its more glamorous butterfly weed cousin, is one of my most valued garden plants. And out-of-garden plants.

 

Above: a beautiful female great spangled fritillary. She's more chocolatey than the male.

 

A Hoary Edge partakes (below). This is a less common relative of silver-spotted skipper. As you can see the white is more diffuse on the Hoary Edge--not a well-defined spot as on the SSSK. I would imagine lots of hoary edges get overlooked.

 

 I like this crazy shot of a fritillary feeding and a bumblebee departing. Sort of surreal.

 I like to remind people who wonder at my fondness for common milkweed that it's a treasured exotic in the best English gardens. And for good reason! Find me a plant, any plant, that offers so much to butterflies and bees, and in such a spectacular way. And that's without even mentioning the monarch brood plant factor.

                                                               All hail Milkweeds!