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Welcome to my zone 9a habitat garden near Houston, Texas.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Giant Swallowtail on yellow cestrum

Yellow cestrum is another of the several "butterfly magnet" plants that I have in my garden. Today I watched as this Giant Swallowtail butterfly spent several minutes nectaring on the shrub.







I love watching these big butterflies and I love photographing them because they are a lot more cooperative than some of the other varieties. Any day that I find one in my garden - and that would be most days at this time of year - is a happy day for me.

4 comments:

  1. I saw a Giant Swallowtail for the first time in my garden this August. I was so excited! I had a hard time photographing it because it is so big and its wings have to constantly move on the blooms. Great captures!

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    1. I find that they often tend to settle for long periods on favored plants, like cestrum, which allows me to capture them with my camera, Karin, unlike so many of the smaller butterflies which flit around so quickly. They can be a real challenge.

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  2. Lovely pictures. I've never seen a giant swallowtai. We have eastern tiger and black swallowtails occasionally in my yard. And I have a bunch of spicebush and just planted a dutchman's pipe to attract the pipevine and spicebush species.

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    1. I have all the swallowtails that you mentioned, Jason, but Giant Swallowtails are the most numerous in my yard at this time of year. However, earlier this year, it would have been the Spicebush for a while and then the Tiger. It's just been a wonderful year for butterflies in my garden.

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