Author: Pam

New England native, Florida resident. Blogging about boating, beach-combing, gardening, camping, and knitting. Work for Zazzle as a designer since 2008.

Good News From the Garden, A New Butterfly is In the World!

Finally, a caterpillar makes it into a chrysalis and then becomes a gorgeous Black Swallowtail butterfly.

Although I am not having much luck with caterpillars surviving in my yard (thanks to the numerous lizards), I do have one that made it. A new Black Swallowtail butterfly has survived to fly away! And he was sneaky about it.

My yard is not a friendly place for caterpillars, but it is for butterflies. All my Zinnias are much loved by lots of flying critters.

The Monarch butterfly is still flying around, and I’ve seen many Monarch caterpillars, but no new butterflies. Also, the Gulf Fritillary has put caterpillars onto my Passionflower vine.

Occasionally I would see the Black Swallowtail butterfly in the yard, but I have nothing growing for it, or so I thought.

Did you know? Celery is a host plant for Black Swallowtails.

The Black Swallowtail’s Favorite Plants

I know the Black Swallowtail will lay eggs on parsley, dill and fennel. Apparently also carrot and Queen Anne’s Lace (not in Florida). It’s not the season for carrots here. Only fennel will grow for me during summer. I have a few fennel plants in the front garden, but lizards eat every caterpillar that shows up. The dill has long been gone, and parsley is impossible to grow, even in winter. (For a list of host plants in Florida, see this page at askIFAS)

But I do have a big celery plant in one of my grow boxes. I started it from a store bought bunch of celery. This is where I found the Black Swallowtail caterpillar. What a surprise! He was already pretty big when I first saw him.

Black swallowtail caterpillar on big celery plant.
What? You like celery?
Black swallowtail feeding on celery
Sorry for the blurriness

On July 21st I first saw the caterpillar. He was happily munching away down in the center of this bunch of celery.

On the 23rd, I saw him curling up and attaching to one of the stalks. The next day, his chrysalis was made. Ten days later, he emerged into the world!

Caterpillar is done eating and in the position to pupate.
Cool huh?
black swallowtail butterfly chrysalis
black swallowtail butterfly chrysalis turning dark
Darkening, means nearly time for a butterfly!

Numbering the Days to Emergence

Back when I watched the chrysalis of the Monarch, it took many days before the butterfly emerged. I figured this one would take a while too, and it took 10 days before I saw the butterfly. On day nine, the chrysalis had darkened noticeably. I knew he / she was about to come into the world!

If the weather had been nice, I would have pulled up a chair and drank my coffee next to the celery plant that morning. But it’s way too hot for that. So, I did some inside stuff, and kept checking on it. Around 9:30am I went out and there he was! Sitting on a celery stalk in all his glory! Such a beauty.

I’m not sure if it is a male or female, maybe someone reading this will know. The colors were absolutely stunning!

black swallowtail butterfly newly hatched
new to the world, a black swallowtail butterfly
black swallowtail butterfly just out of the chrysalis

I thought he might hang around for a while after coming out. The Monarch butterfly had taken hours to fly away. But, I went on the porch to check on some plants and was only away for about 2 minutes. When I went back outside he was completely gone! I missed it!

I walked around the yard to see if he had landed someplace close by, but I never saw him anywhere.

A Black Swallowtail From the Top

Only the closed wings were available for me to view. I believe from the top this one would have looked something like the photo below, which is not my photo.

Find more good info about the Swallowtails at the University of Wisconsin site

black swallowtail butterfly from the top
Photo courtesy of anselmo7511 at Pixabay.

Before this butterfly “hatched”, I had a black swallowtail laying eggs on the celery and a nearby carrot type plant. Those eggs seem to have disappeared. Or, maybe they are tiny caterpillars hiding down in the celery. I will continue to check.

The fact that my cat Skittle mostly hangs around this area might be why the lizards let this guy get to this stage. Whatever the reason, it made me happy!

Are you following caterpillars and butterflies in your summer yard? I’d love to hear about it.

butterfly divider flowers

More garden happenings

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Mid-summer Update on the Vegega Raised Beds

It’s mid-summer and here in my Florida backyard I have mostly flowers growing. I’ve used my three Vegega raised beds to hold some things and some are doing better than others. More amendments for Fall will be needed.

Over the past winter and spring, I set up some new raised beds. I bought the metal beds from Vegega after watching a YouTube video. Another Floridian had purchased from this company and she had lots of good things to say.

I garden on my own, and it took a bit of time to assemble, fill and plant the beds. You can read my post here. I knew that they would need time to “cook” me up some great soil. Branches, leaves and old growth were tossed in along with compost, dirt, mulch and earthworms. I knew the soil would settle and slowly compost. Still, I planted all three beds with some flowers and vegetables to see what happened.

The Round Vegega Raised Bed

This is my oldest bed. It gets more shade than the others also. I had some lovely Ubatuba pepper plants growing in here, and a cherry tomato. All of them eventually died. I believe it was a lack of good soil and drainage. I plan to add more good soil and amendments as Fall approaches.

Now it is mid-summer and a Tulsi basil is planted along with a few cowpeas (cover crop beans). One Celosia, one marigold, and a small pepper plant are struggling.

An empty, or partially empty raised bed is a good place to set potted plants.

Round Vegega raised garden bed in dark green

The Long Vegega Raised Bed

My long, oval bed was the most difficult to set up. I love the shape though. It is full of sweet potatoes (I hope – I see lots of vines) with Zinnias around the edge.

This plant mixing was not a great idea. The sweet potato vines keep trying to wrap around the flowers. By September I will be digging up this bed and getting it ready for Fall planting.

Vegega metal raised bed, oblong shape
My long oval raised garden bed made of metal, with sweet potatoes and zinnias growing.

The Square Vegega Raised Bed

The dirt in my square raised bed has sunken quite a lot. Aside from one hot pepper plant, the bed holds flowers. Many Celosia and a few Zinnias are growing nicely. Like all the other beds, I will add compost and more dirt when Fall approaches.

Square Vegega raised bed in the backyard

Plans for Fall Growing

While summer is fine for growing flowers, in Fall I want to grow food! Each of these beds will hold fall crops. Between the big beds, the white barrels, and all my smaller grow boxes, I should have plenty of space for vegetables.

First I have to add more compost. My homemade compost is “cooking” and has been all summer. I’ll use it to amend the gardens, but I’ll also have to buy some. I definitely don’t grow my own food to save money! In fact it costs quite a bit, at least to get started. The point is to have very fresh, organic food to eat. You can’t get fresher than stepping out your backdoor and picking a salad for supper!

Thanks for reading!

garden scene

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Ordering Seeds For Florida Fall Planting

Fall is coming soon. The time to order seeds for planting in Florida’s cooler months has come.

It’s easy to forget to order seeds for Fall planting because we only do that here in the south. When the rest of the country is winding down, cleaning up gardens, and raking leaves, our best planting time just arriving.

It is July, and suddenly I realized that Fall will be here in no time. I got busy ordering seeds from my favorite online places.

My Fall Planting List

This list contains the vegetables I will be growing from seed. Most will be planted sometime in October. After lots of trial and error, this my favorites list. I love to eat this food. Some things take forever to grow, but they are worth the wait.

Here is what I’ve ordered, with the company name.

  • Carrots – (SESE) – take 4-5 months to grow
  • Bulb Onions – (SESE & Baker Creek) – take 4-5 months to grow
  • Contender Green Beans – (SESE & The Urban Harvest) – Fast growing bush type. Succession plant all winter. Good for soil too. Have tried others, but love Contender.
  • Beets – (Baker Creek, golden, & SESE) – Usually stay small, and take a lot of time. But I love beets.
  • Chijimisai – (The Urban Harvest) – fast growing green with roundish leaves. A favorite winter green.
  • Arugula – (Baker Creek) – Grew it 2 years ago.
  • Kale – (SESE) – Not much luck before, but will try again.

Maybe I waited too long, but I had to order from a few places to get the seeds I wanted. I try to buy organic seeds, but I don’t think Baker Creek’s seeds are organic. Their seeds are heirloom and non-GMO. A lot of my currently growing Zinnias came from Baker Creek.

I have some old seeds, which are dated 2024. I’ll plant the new seeds first and if there is space left anywhere, I will throw in some older stuff.

Seeds Saved For Fall Planting

I’ve cut way down on saving seeds, but some I do save. Dill and borage like cooler weather and saving dill seeds is so easy to do. Borage is a bit trickier. I have to catch the pod before it opens and drops the black seeds out. But, this means I will have borage popping up all over – finger’s crossed.

Hont sai flowering broccoli is another one with easy to save seeds. I like to grow it for the yellow flowers that bugs love. I’m not too particular when planting and pretty much scatter the seeds around.

Holy basil is a recent favorite to grow, and it grows year round. I think it does better in cooler weather.

flowers of hon tsai broccoli
Flowering Hon Tsai Broccoli
dill flowers going to seed
Dill going to seed
yellow dill flower with wasp
Dill flower
Florida borage flowering
November flowers on borage.
Holy basil

Marigolds From Seed, and Deterring Nematodes

I did order some new Zinnia seeds and French Marigolds from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. The Golden Guardian marigold variety is supposed to be very good at repelling nematodes.

Here in the south, we tend to have to deal with nematodes. They like warm weather. I have been unsuccessful at growing peppers in my yard. My eggplants that are in the ground also look pretty bad. It’s possible I have some kind of nematodes. I need to work on that by planting marigolds – maybe throughout the year. Possibly as long as they have sun they will be happy.

tall marigold in Florida garden
marigold
marigold in garden

The Marigolds I have growing now are mostly flower-less. They are very tall. When they quit growing, I will cut them up and mix them into the compost.

Florida’s gardening site has this to say about planting marigolds. Also, on this page entitled, Garden Myths, Volume 1. I still say it’s worth a try. I’ll be sure to write about trying to grow Marigolds during our Florida winter season.

green divider leaves long
Read on…

February Garden Planting

It is the end of February and here in Florida I am getting some seedlings and sweet potato slips into the raised beds.

Pam's avatar by Pam

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One Summer Morning

July is nearing an end and the garden is teeming with living things.

July is nearly over. Hard to believe, but I’m glad. It’s not a fun month here in Central Florida. Not that what’s coming is any better. The Hurricane months are the worst. Soon we’ll be watching those storms that build off the African coast and wonder where they will go.

But, that fun is for the future. Today I discovered a big Swallowtail caterpillar on my celery plant! Swallowtails need dill, fennel, parsley and apparently celery for their caterpillars. The dill was gone back in May, and I can’t seem to grow parsley – especially not in summer. I have some fennel out front, and checked for caterpillars, and found none. I didn’t realize my celery would attract swallowtails.

This big guy was just there! I had not seen him while he chewed and grew, down in the center of the stalks. All day I went outside to check on him. I’m certain he will disappear.

The celery grew from a stalk that came from the grocery store. Today, I am starting another celery plant in a glass on my windowsill. It is very easy to grow.

Black swallowtail caterpillar on celery
black swallowtail caterpillar
Starting celery from cut bunch
celery started from store bought
First little watermelon
First little watermelon

Watermelon

I had to pick my watermelon because the stem area was beginning to rot, for some reason. But, I also discovered watermelon #2 hidden under the vines. I covered it with pine needles to try to keep the raccoons away. I like to kid myself that I can outsmart them.

Celery plant with Swallowtail caterpillar
Caterpillar
Seminole pumpkin vines
Seminole Pumpkin vines
watermelon growing
Watermelon #2

The pumpkin vines (first year) have nearly covered my walkway. I can’t easily move the hose so have to leave it in the middle.

The Holy basil is growing and I’m using it regularly. Firespike flowers are coming out and that will keep the hummingbird happy. The celosia plants are getting tall and should be flowering soon.

Holy basil with flowering stalks
Holy basil
Firespike plant is beginning to bloom
Firespike
Celosia stalks growing in barrel bed
Celosia

Oh The Zinnias!

My garden is full of beautiful Zinnias. I look at each one when I inspect things. I can’t stop photographing them. I only began growing zinnias a couple of years ago, but they have become a favorite. I’ve decided to make dividers for this blog using all my zinnia photos.

This year I have lots of reds, pinks, and gorgeous orange. I have only one yellow, so I’ll be sure to save it. Honestly, I am saving many Zinnia flower heads. Some have grown from saved seeds, but many I planted from newly purchased seeds.

yellow zinnia
Only one plant is yellow.

Skittle

Skittle the cat has always been my shadow in the garden. She very much enjoys it when I inspect things. I can’t spend much time out there with her now because of the horrendous heat. She seems to love it. As long as she can find an uncomfortable looking place to sleep, she is happy.

Skittle

I’m mostly quite happy as I look through the garden. Occasionally I get depressed at the lack of food, but there is always the grocery store. Good thing.

The Monarch butterflies are still fluttering each day. They usually show up around 9:00am. They land on the zinnias frequently. Their tropical milkweed is not flowering now, but soon the swamp milkweed will be.

zinnias divider

Thank you for reading.

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Good Morning, or Is It?

Garden troubles.

I am writing today to make you feel better. Yup, it’s a pretty depressing morning here, so I hope that will make you feel better about your bad start to the day. If you had a good start, yay for you. If you are having gardening troubles, you are not alone.

Here in the jungle, summer is the pits. It is too hot to be outside for long, and if I venture out, it’s either loaded with bug repellent, or covered in long sleeves and pants.

On top of that, there is very little in the way of food growing. All my Seminole pumpkins start to grow, then turn yellow and fall off the vine.

Finally, I have one that looks like it will continue to grow. And today I see that raccoons (my best guess) have scratched it all up!

The Dahlia is wilting. We just had a little tropical system swirling over our area of the state and it dropped 4 inches of rain. We had minor flooding, which went away quickly. But maybe the dahlia did not like all that water. Maybe it doesn’t like July in Florida. I can’t blame it.

Dahlia wilting

The weeds, or should I say, grass has gone nuts. This is all getting away from me because of all the vines that are sprawling all over the yard. The squash vine is done, and I should pull it up. But it’s too hot and buggy.

The watermelon vines have 1 watermelon. The pumpkin vines – well, I mentioned that above. Those vines have nearly made it from the back of the house to the front. They’ve dropped about 10 pumpkins at this point.

pumpkin vines along the pathway

Speaking of vines. That mound in the distance in my photo above is an Elm tree next to a Beautyberry bush. Below is a photo of the two trees with most of the vines pulled off. I used to work at this, even though this is not part of my yard. I’d love to see both grow and do well. As you can see it’s a losing battle.

These are trying to grow under that mound of vines in the photo above.

Vines covering tree

A banana pepper plant has died, and the other peppers don’t look so good. So it’s a depressing start to the day for me. I think I’ll stay inside.

The Maypop Plants Have Caterpillars

Caterpillars seen on the Maypop plants. These are from the orange, Gulf Fritillary.

This morning, while making my rounds in the garden, I noticed three caterpillars on the Maypop (Passionvine, or Passionflower).

I started these plants from seeds purchased from Johnny Butterfly Seed. The plants are still small and have been growing for only a few months. It’s the first time I’ve seen caterpillars on them.

Gulf Fritillary caterpillars on Maypop / Passionflower vine

The orange caterpillars with black hairs are from the Gulf Fritillary butterfly. The caterpillars of the Variegated Fritillary look very similar. I’m guessing they are from the Gulf variety. I’ve recently seen the orange butterflies in my yard.

Below is an excellent photo of the Gulf Fritillary butterfly. Image source is linked beneath the photo. I rarely get a good photo of butterflies, but this is exactly what they look like.

Image by Paul Brennan from Pixabay

Whenever I see a butterfly in my yard, I run to grab my Butterflies of Central Florida pamphlet to identify it. I already know the Monarch, Gulf Fritillary, Zebra wing, Black Swallowtail, and Giant Swallowtail. All the others send me searching for their names.

Butterfly pamphlet
Butterflies of Central Florida pamphlet
Inside the pamphlet

The Butterflies of Central Florida pamphlet (paid link to Amazon) has 11 pages of photos with information. I bought mine at the local nursery.

This little waterproof, laminated pamphlet contains photos of the butterfly and its caterpillar or larvae, with its name. It also has their size (wingspan), time of year when they fly, and their preferred host plant / plants. I had thought that some of the images were moths, but I think they are all butterflies.

I like that the host plant is listed. That way, if you want more butterflies, simply plant the host plant they need.

As far as these caterpillars go, I’m wondering if they will disappear like all the Monarchs seem to. If not, I wonder how much of these plants they will consume!