My initial shock and dismay over the vast destruction laid to my Cinnamon Sun sunflowers and Zexmenia by millions and gazillions of caterpillars all at one time were fortunately temporary emotions, and I’ve adjusted to this new level of habitat. I’m back to feeling happy, content, and utterly pleased. The butterflies fluttering about the garden today are more numerous than I’d ever dreamed of (I’m still astounded by this, I admit), and they swept me up in waves of joy and peace. Soon, all those hundreds of ravenous Bordered Patch caterpillars that caused me momentary freak-out will create an even more amazing butterfly scene — who can argue with that?
So I won’t dwell on the skeleton leaves and plant carcasses they are leaving behind and I will instead rejoice in the fact that most of the plants so far are surviving and putting on a beautiful bloom display — 30 blooms almost entirely on one Cinnamon Sun plant alone. I get to report on new butterflies in the garden, as well, and also bees and spiders, and this habitat mama is happy as a clam.
If ever there was a question about sunflowers being so aptly named, I present this photo as a clear argument for the appropriateness. It shows the fiery side of the sun in flower form. In fact, I almost named this post Sunrise or Sunset after this shot, because that’s what it makes me think of, but I actually took this in the middle of the day, so it would be cheating.
As I hovered around my sunflowers, alternating between pictures of blooms and caterpillar damage, I was joined by hummingbirds just a few feet away at the Standing Cypress, flying closer to me than ever and completely ignoring me. I missed the snapshot, though, because the two hummingbirds suddenly had one of their feisty spats and flew off. I’m not sure they even realized how close to me they were.
And then I saw the bees at the sunflowers, and my attention turned back to the fiery blazes before me. These weren’t honeybees — they were “Yellow Butt Bees” as I called them when I first saw them (Please don’t think that’s their real name! I was just distinguishing them from the similarly-sized honeybees we all know. Besides, perhaps “Yellow Belly” would be more appropriate; I can hear Yosemite Sam now calling them Yellow-bellied Varmints… except they are no varmints!). The best I could do was try to get some pictures in the poor light so that I could ID them later. I believe they are the species Megachile perihirta. Western Leafcutter Bees. Texas natives, woot.
Why are they called Leafcutter Bees? Well, they cut small little circles out of leaves and use the pieces to fashion little nest cells, adding to them some nectar and pollen for the eggs they’ll lay. These solitary bees are some of the bees that benefit from Bee Boxes.
At one point, one of the bees looked straight at me. The little bee looks so cute that it seems unreal — my son actually thought I stuck the bee image onto the photo. I like to think that it was posing for the camera and not considering me a momentary threat. In any case, it was cute enough to become a header shot for the blog page (scroll up and click refresh if you’d like to see it).
At the same time as their larger cousins, tinier native bees were also busy at work. They are harder to see, crawling in and out of the little flower parts.
These native bees are the best pollinators a garden could ask for. Hugs to them all.
Back at the Gregg’s Mistflower in the Spider’s Favorite Locale, a spider reigns queen predator. I believe she is a Banded Garden Spider, Argiope trifasciata. And I think she might be the very same spider I found in the same spot a couple of weeks ago, perhaps then a juvenile and now mature (I’ve edited that post). She’s a beauty, and highly successful in her predator talents. She had four wrapped-up carcasses that she was very focused on, and within hours she had consumed them, removed them, and repaired the web, ready for more.
She’s as beautiful on her upper exterior…
as she is underneath. In fact, I shot the picture below first before I even realized she was facing away from me.
I spy what might be pollen seeping through the silk encasing — might that be another bee? Gah. The nature of nature, once again.
To follow up on the Bordered Patch butterflies, I’m happy to report that they do eat Straggler Daisy, or Horseherb. In fact, there are already other groups of them out there munching away. The ones in the picture below are a little too small for me to identify for sure as Bordered Patch, but they are surely related, at the very least.
I took a few of the more severely devasted sunflower leaves still covered with tons of caterpillars and relocated the little crawlies to the Horseherb for a dietary change, and so far so good. There are still many dozens on the sunflowers, but I feel better about all the plants’ chances at this point. And as I mentioned last time, I’ve got plenty of Horseherb to go around. I also discovered even more groups of young caterpillars on the Zexmenia, but those plants are fairly well established and are thus on their own. I read that one Bordered Patch female can lay 500 eggs — now I understand why I have such an invasion of munching munchers.
The older caterpillars are looking quite interesting, now that they are getting large.
Hmmm. Another caterpillar discovery. I have Genista moth caterpillars munching on one of my Texas Mountain Laurels, and eggs on another. But from what I read, the laurels should be okay. There are so many mountain laurels here in Austin, Texas, and they all do okay, right? The damage is ugly, though, but not devastating. I think. Hmmm, I feel the inkling of worry again…
I’m not sure whether these are Genista eggs, but I suspect they could be.
While I was walking around outside, something large moving by caught my eye. At first I thought it was a bird, but then I realized it was a butterfly. From a distance I couldn’t tell whether it was a Giant Swallowtail or an Eastern Tiger, but it was definitely huge. And then it came down right by me for a nectar feast on the butterfly bush. An Eastern Tiger Swallowtail. Yay!
It’s the first time one has stayed still long enough for me to get a non-blurry picture. The sun was too harsh, but I’ll take what I can get. I continue to have a wary eye on the butterfly bush (Buddleia davidii, a non-native with a questionable reputation), but it earned big points when that Eastern Tiger landed upon it.
I’m still waiting on my Giants to emerge from their chrysalises. I’m getting nervous, as I always do.
Buckeyes are here now! New visitors to the garden. So beautiful.
And I still can’t resist the charm of the Cinnamon Sun sunflowers. More pictures must be posted.
See what I mean?
They have been determined to find a way past the cage we put around the birdfeeder –pretty much since the very moment it was first up there.
The cage is there because the doves had flocked to the feeder between 20-30 at a time, all grabbing as much as possible from the feeder before the next birds shoved them off. We just couldn’t afford to fill the feeder twice a day, which is what was starting to happen. And the little songbirds couldn’t get through without a pause in the dove line-up.
But the drive for the treasure of seed inside the cage kept those persistent doves trying. They’d observe the other birds patiently. And finally some figured out how to land just right to get their body through an opening. They could either hold onto the cage precariously, stretching their neck through to grab some seed…
or if they landed just right, they could hop through the window and walk on the tray below.
Well, now they are used to it and we are back to two doves at a time sometimes on the feeder. Still better than the 20ish that would fight over the feeder — at least the cage prevents that!
And of course, our lovely resident house finches enjoy the thistle, though they go for the big feeder whenever it’s available.
Which it mostly is, except when these bird brains show up — squirrels.
But the squirrels don’t eat a lot, so we mostly enjoy watching their agility and cleverness.
Sometimes birds will share the space with the squirrel… usually on the opposite side of the feeder. The squirrel never seems to care.
And the cage has really been amazing — it’s a constant show of songbirds now, all sharing the feeder and taking turns. Chickadees, Cardinals, Finches, Titmice, and more. They all gather up.
Clever birdies.
This next photo makes it look much darker than it really is — the moth is actually a very dainty pink. And dainty in size, too!
Shudder. 
Then I was hit with the realization that they’d completely defoliated many of the leaves of the yellow sunflowers, to the point that I’m not sure whether there’s a future in sight for any of the already-struggling annuals. 
