Montauk Daisies

It's getting near the end of the year for the garden and we've seen an outburst of flowers. They are Montauk Dasies and there are groupings of the on the left, the center, and the far right on the back hill.  They are the white flowering bushes in the panorama below.

A more detailed look at one grouping looks like this:

These are from the grouping on the far left in the panorama. The former owners must have really liked these because there are more than 10 bushes of these on the back hill.  When they show up, they show up in force.  They give a nice pop of white late in the season and they should be blooming until the first frost - hopefully not too soon.

I read that they also attract bees and butterflies - THEY DO.  The following pictures were taken within  30 minutes a couple of days ago.

It was late afternoon and the sun was going down, so I was able to get some shots where the wings were back-light (backlit?) had back-light. I have not researched this specific butterfly, but the split wings are interesting. It's not one big wing like a swallowtail or a monarch. The second and third pictures almost make it look like a jet fighter wing configuration.

I was also trying some different camera settings to try and darken the background to minimize distractions. I was happy with these shots and will continue practicing my photography skills. Particularly since we are getting to the end of the gardening seasons.

FLIES - (dragon and butter that is)

The pictures are making their annual transition from flora to fauna as the Spring and early Summer bloomers have invited in the flies. The butterflies, and a dragonfly earlier this week.

The butterfly bushes have been blooming for a couple weeks now, and the phlox and lilac have been blooming for ahwile. The lilac is over now, but we had some nice blossoms considering it was just planted last year and had to winter over one of the coldest winters in years.

The first butterfly I saw (and got pictures of) was a cabbage butterfly.  I thought it was a moth at first, but after posting pictures I was told that it's a cabbage butterfly. I love my friends who can help me learn more about what's happening in my backyard.

Here are some pictures of a cabbage butterfly.

On one of the butterfly bushes up against the back fence.

I love the colors of the butterfly bush,
but I have to be almost on top of it to see the blossoms and colors.

This has a lot going on for a "simple" picture.  The depth of field
 (the out of focus elements framing the center)
 and the parallels between the spots on the wing and the leaf make me really like this shot.
I wish I could claim credit for having planned it all, but I still appreciate it.

I was also able to get some pictures of a dragonfly as it stopped to rest on one of the statues in the garden. I really like how delicate the wings are - you can see the texturing of the statue even through the darker sections of the wings.

He's resting on the back of a dog's head (statue) - I hope he doesn't get any ideas to start riding around on any of the fur babies. I don't know how they would react.

A day or two later I saw my first tiger swallowtail of the summer. It was hanging around the phlox before moving over to the butterfly bushes. I got a picture at the butterfly bushes, but it wasn't as nice as these ones at the phlox.  The colors really pop in contrast between the fushia and the yellow.

And I also got pictures of some smaller butterflies - I have not researched the exact variety yet.  But I don't recall seeing these last year. So I'll have to do some googling to see If I can identify them.

Since there are two of them there, I'm hoping there will be more coming.

Early Fall visitors passing through

On Sunday afternoon we saw a few visitors that we hadn't seen before in the yard.  I went to get the camera, but didn't take time for the tripod, so these shots were "freehand" and some at high zoom.  But I wanted to get some pictures.

This was the first one that caught my eye while I was out with the dogs on the patio.

I haven't seen any monarchs, so I was excited to get some pictures.  He was probably migrating through, given the time of year, but it was still fun to see him. He was checking out some of the late blooms on one of the butterfly bushes.

While I was out there with the camera I decided to get some shots of the daisies. They're finally blooming and adding a lot to the garden.

They were having their own visitors too.

But then I spotted this guy.

Thanks to Google Image Search (where you can upload a picture and search for similar images) I was able to identify this as a Variegated Fritillary.  The site where I found the other pictures like this had a lot of examples from North Carolina, so he could have been migrating south as well.  I haven't seen him before, so I'm glad I already had the camers to get a couple pictures to be able to identify him.

I'll be using the Google image search more often to help me identify the plants and visitors in the yard.  One of my goals is to identify the different plants we got when we bought the house.  It's been over three years now and I want to be sure I know how to care for the plants, and how to identify what might be toxic to the dogs.

Butterflies, Butterflies, Butterflies

The butterfly bushes are blooming.

Tiger Swallowtail

Tiger Swallowtail

Black Swallowtail

Black Swallowtail

Black Swallowtail

Tiger Swallowtails

Black Swallowtail

Zebra Swallowtail

Zebra Swallowtail

Black Swallowtail

A Bounty of Butterflies

It seems like everyone tries to attract butterflies (and hummingbirds.)  We have four butterfly bushes along the back fence, and they're living up to their name.  We chose them because we know they are fast growing and we were looking for something to act as a natural screen in front of the chain fence across the top of the hill in the back yard. We were looking for privacy fencing and counted the butterflies as a bonus.

The bonus has come calling this summer.

I recognize the Eastern Tiger Swallowtails - the yellow ones - but I don't know what the dark visitor is called.  Here are a couple more shots to show off his vivid colors at the wingtips.

If anybody recognizes him, please leave a comment and tell me what he is.

Meanwhile in another corner of the yard, a neighbor had his own agenda:

He wasn't interested in sharing his dinner with anyone.