August-All the World A Garden

 

Recently, just over 6 1/2 inches of rain fell in Chattanooga, Tennessee. It happened very quickly and took everyone by surprise.  There was a video of a woman being rescued from her car on I-24. (It was a young man who worked for a power company, and he was able to break the window and pull her to safety.) I hope you can see the video that I have for you above. This brought tears to my eyes. What a hero! (One of his co-workers handed him that heavy tool from their truck, he said afterward he will always carry a hammer in his vehicle now just for this purpose!)

If anyone remembers, our son and daughter-in-law live in Chattanooga and they are fine, but you know I always watch the news very carefully for that area!

The news of the floods and wildfires and now, an impending hurricane...there is always so much to watch out for! 

It has been so incredibly hot that it has been hard to think.  We try to get out as early as we can before the sun heats everything to the boiling point. (My brain included.) Still, it's good for the butterflies!

The first photo is on my zinnias which are in pots at my house and the second photo are of two butterflies on a butterfly bush at the Monastery. You know Richard took the Monastery one!

The Monastery gets so many visitors they are building a new block of restrooms. The thought and design behind this building is much appreciated. When we saw they were clearing trees, we asked what was coming, so that is how we know. If you don't know, ask! 

This isn't finished yet, but I just know it will be lovely and will look as if it has always been there. I love the arched doorways and the copper gutters and downspouts.  Can you tell that I am interested in architecture? It's true, I am! I am not that knowledgeable about it; I am never sure what things are called but I just know what I like. 

We just took care of a zebra finch for a dear friend. We just decided to bring the caged bird to our house to make it easier since we had her for almost two weeks. I called her "Beepy". If you have ever heard a zebra finch, you will know why! We love birds and we have put out fresh water for our wild birds so much, we told this caged bird that she was welcome at our "bird spa"! We have a bird clock that has bird calls on the hour and this little finch liked the 7 o'clock hour, that is the Carolina wren song. Maybe it was the loudest? Not sure, only that she responded the most to that one.

I think I have told you before that if you see a lot of blue at the bottom of the wing of the tiger swallowtail butterfly, it is a female. So- looking good, girl! 

We go for years without seeing any blooms on our night blooming cereus cactus, but this summer, we had a total of four flowers! As the name tells you, they only bloom at night, opening in full at about midnight and they begin to close as soon as the sun rises.  My Aunt Leona gave us this plant in 1994. Richard lugs it into the garage every single winter. (St. Richard!) 

As you can see, we haven't been away very much.  Still, I enjoy the adventures of others through my blog!  In my dreams, I have been to Yorkshire with Meike...From My Mental Library: Ripon 2025 - Day 8

And thanks to Bob, I am thinking and learning more of Scotland!  Alex and Bob`s Blue Sky Scotland: Levengrove Park and The Havoc Grasslands Walk.

And can you believe it, BOTH of these bloggers made a reference to "The Secret Garden", one of my favorite books.  I hope you love it as much as I do.  If you have not read it, do so, right away. You're welcome. 

"If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden".

There Will Be Butterflies (And Beatles and Bee Gees!)

 

Happy August to all my friends! 

I hope you are able to see the video that I have above for you! It is a clip of The Bee Gees from a TV show called "The Midnight Special" that used to come on very late at night (or early hours of the morning, technically.) This was from 1973.  The Bee Gees had had a bit of a slump in their career, so they decided to perform these songs by the Beatles. Of course, they are wonderful!  Enjoy.

Red Admiral Butterfly!   (Vanessa Atalanta)

 It is a medium sized butterfly with black wings, red bands and white spots. The first time that we saw this butterfly, Richard identified it immediately. It is also in England! Why is it called "Admiral"?  The word just became that over the years; it was really called the Red "Admirable"! Language is interesting that way. Now, whenever you meet up with this butterfly, you should look at it and think, you certainly are deserving of admiration.  (Hard to get a photo of it, it was a very fast flier.)

Viceroy Butterfly (Limenitis Archippus). 

It is a North American butterfly, and it is a mimic of the Monarch butterfly.  Many say that it is hard to tell them apart, but I will tell you how to do so.  The Viceroy is about 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 inches in size and the Monarch is 3 1/2 to 5 inches.  So, the Monarch is much bigger! Now, if the butterfly opens its wings, look for that black line across the bottom of the wings. See it in the photo above? That is certainly a Viceroy! (The Monarch does not have this.)

The above small brown butterfly might not seem very colorful or exciting, but we were so pleased to see it! We had never seen it before, and it took a while to identify it. (Richard did so from our book, "Butterflies of North America".  We do a lot of searches on our computer but sometimes, it is just good to thumb through a book.) It is a Northern Pearly Eye butterfly! (Lethe Anthedon) Pearly eyes are grouped under "Pearly-eyes and Browns".  All pearly eyes and browns are brown, medium sized butterflies.  Pearly eyes have the hindwing spots surrounded as a group with white. Browns have a white circle around EACH eye-spot.  Okay, got that now?  Tee hee, you do not want to know how long I studied Richard's photo and the photos in my book and online.  Really, you don't! The pearly eye caterpillar feeds on canes and other grasses and I was pleased to recognize the river cane under the bridge on the trail, very close to this butterfly! (Thank you, Phil who told us about river cane on a hike at Panola Mountain State Park one time.  I ♥ park rangers!)

We also saw a Red Spotted Purple butterfly on this trail. 

(Limenitis Arthemis)

Just to confuse us, it has beautiful blue wings with orange spots!  

All of these butterflies are unlikely to be in your garden. All pictured here were in a wetlands area, near a little stream on the trail at Johnson Park, here in Rockdale County, Georgia.   This particular part of the trail is next to a big stand of trees.  They do not feed on nectar from flowers but rather from tree sap, rotting fruit and even animal dung. 

I was going to end my post just there but how can I end it on "animal dung"?  No, I will tell you about the butterflies that visit us that do eat the nectar from flowers but that will have to wait until another post.  All the flower loving butterflies like the Gulf Fritillary above have really enjoyed the zinnias in our garden. I am so very happy to tell you that I planted them from seed! I want to tell the world, "plant zinnia seeds!".  There, let me say again, "plant zinnia seeds" and the butterflies will come, I promise. 

Butterflies  = happiness!