Butterflies really fly free

This year has been a wonderful year for butterflies in Southern Ontario. Partly due to the very mild winter (which has been blamed for the raise in many of the bug populations) and partly because of the winds, which gusted from the South in mid - April, allowing the butterflies to hitch a ride, we have been blessed with their presence.

In Toronto in early May, there were many sightings of butterflies.  A Red Admiral even flew into a street car I was riding one day after work. (Of course it could have been a Painted Lady, the colouration is very similar, and they all look a bit like Monarchs to me when they're flying by ... except of course, the Painted Lady and Red Admiral are smaller than the Monarch).

Red Admiral , Painted Lady and Common Buckey (photo credit, G. Richardson and A. Guidotti)

Up at Kelly Gardens at the end of May, the air was filled with Giant Swallowtails. We probably saw 3 a day!

Here's one having a rest on the lawn (I'm being sarcastic... we don't have a lawn).

And here's a Giant Swallowtail at the Montreal Botanical Gardens.

Although I loved seeing the butterflies at the MBG along with thousands of other people, I much prefer to see them in the wild.

Now don't forget, if you want to continue to see them, you need 3 things.

Firstly, you need plants with nectar to feed the butterflies. Species plants have more nectar than Hybrids.
Secondly, you need plants that the butterflies will lay their eggs on, (each butterfly has a preferred host plant) and third and perhaps most importantly ... know your caterpillars, because without caterpillars there will be no butterflies!

Painted Lady Caterpillar

Common Buckeye Caterpillar

Red Admiral Caterpillar

And the Giant Swallowtail caterpillar is so ugly, I don't want to post a picture of it. Call me squeamish, but I'm not fond of bugs.   It looks a bit like bird poop, except when it gets threatened and then it extends these red horns and gives off a nasty scent. And this ugly duckling becomes an exquisite butterfly. Go figure.

Don't blink or you'll miss it

Some of the most delightful flowers only open for a day before they die. The most common is the Hibiscus, which you can see in almost every supermarket floral department.

Today our Astrophytum bloomed. I had been watching the flower bud swelling on top of the catus, and warned David that it would be blooming any day now. We missed the opportunity to photograph it a couple of times last year, since we didn't know the bloom would only last a day and by the time we checked up on it after work, it had already closed.

Caught it this time though.  It is a hybrid and the cactus is about 1 1/2 inches wide by 1 inch tall.  At its peak the flower is as big as the cactus. It blooms a couple of times a year and it has no scent.

The Kelly Gardens Sign

David and I visit Kensington Market every Friday after work to do our grocery shopping. We've been going with great regularity for a couple of years now, and the people in the shops we frequent have come to know us.  We like it like that. It's somewhat old fashioned, but we enjoy having the connection of a small community in the midst of the big, anonymous city.

Often we have our supper at  the Tibet Cafe - a restaurant that serves a strange mixture of different foods; we always get the "momos"  - little dumplings filled with meat served in a light broth. Delicious.  It is  here we first saw the art of Sae Kimura, a lovely young artist from Japan who is visiting Canada for an extended stay. I loved her whimsical art and she had a little notice offering to do commissions. She offered to create something if you shared your dreams with her. It wasn't such a large step to think that she might be able to paint a new sign for our garden.

 We met with Sae, and showed her pictures of the lot, and the blog, and described some of the things that made our place special, and she went away and thought about it.

Pines and rocks are common on our lake front

A happy little frog having a rest on the bunkie window

A yellow swallow tail

We get lots of visitors on the bunkie windows.   Considering how voracious the appetite of dragon fly is, it is amazing that we don't fear them.

When we met again, she produced the lid of a metal drum (which she had found) on which to paint the sign - and a few sketches of how she imagined the sign would appear.We liked her proposal, and gave her the thumbs up to go away and create.

I knew she was talented, but little did I suspect she would come up with such a perfect image for Kelly Gardens. We had described some of the wildlife we saw and the many pine trees, and she incorporated all these elements into the sign... and as an added bonus, David and I are also included.

Close up to show detail

When we find a place to hang it, I'll post more pictures with the "Kelly Gardens" sign, in - situ.

Butterflies Fly Free

During the winter doldrum months between February and April, we wait impatiently for Spring to arrive. At this time of the year, the Montreal Botanical Gardens closes off one end of their extensive greenhouses and brings in hundreds of tropical butterflies to fly free amongst the plants.  It's a highly promoted and very popular attraction that keeps visitors coming to the MBG during the "no grow" season.

You have to really want to see them to make a visit, as there always seems to be a wait in line to get in (and the children are amazingly patient). It's almost as much fun to watch the people interacting with the butterflies as it is to watch the butterflies themselves. Once you pass through the butterfly proof barrier, people seem to lose both their inhibitions and their sense of decorum as they stand with their arms out hoping one will land on them. And then there are the truly annoying people who don't seem to understand "Don't touch the butterflies" in either English, French, or sign language. (A line drawing of a butterfly held in a hand with a red circle and cross through it is pretty explicit I'd say).

However, despite, the lines and the crowds, it is a truly magical experience, and an extremely sad one too. We shouldn't have to pay to stand in a crowded greenhouse to be with one of nature's most endearing creatures; we should be restoring their habitats, not spraying every caterpillar in sight, and then perhaps we could experience these beautiful ephemeral insects where they should be seen - in their natural habitats.

Here are some shots of the butterflies.

Myscelia ethusa (Mexican Bluewing )

The Tailed Green Jay (Graphium agamemnon).
Native to India, South East Asia and Australia.

This is a blue butterfly (I think it's the Blue Morpho).
When it's not flying it folds its wings and the brown underside provides camouflage.
Native to Central and Southern America it is severely threatened in the wild.
This Blue Morpho has landed on David's shirt.

Papilio Déiphobus Rumanzovia - Male.
 It can be found in Australasia (especially Indonesia).

You get a sense of how glorious the butterflies are through the pictures but there's nothing to compare with seeing them in flight. For example, the Papilio Deiphobus Rumanzovia is a bit boring in the photograph, but it is transformed in flight. Take a look for yourself.  Notice the "don't touch the butterfly" sign at the base of the plant (that is if you can tear your eyes away from the butterfly).

Here's a better view of the underside of the wings of the Papilio Déiphobus Rumanzovia.  I don't know what the plant is that this one is feeding on, but I've seen other photos of it on the web drinking at this flower. It must be a particular favorite of this species.

This is the Malabar Tree Nymph, or Rice Paper (Idea malabarica) butterfly. It can be found in Southern India and South East Asia. Notice the way this one is perched on the citrus flower rather than flapping its wings. I'm not sure if that's because some species like to drink on the fly or just because there really isn't a place to perch on some types of flowers. Hmmm, that's a good question to ask a butterfly expert.

The next butterfly is the Birdwing (Troides rhadamantus). This is a female. You have absolutely no idea how stunning the underside of Birdwing is from the top! Watch the video below and you'll see what I mean.

This is the Birdwing sipping the nectar from what I think is a lantana. The yellow and red body is a startling surprise.

What you see here are mostly the white butterflies that actually play together in flight. Sometimes, 2 or 3 of them will appear to perform an aerial ballet. The blue butterflies also play in the same manner, as they are in the same family.

This was the 15th year the MBG hosted the Butterflies Go Free exhibit, and this year they divided it into two exhibits:- the butterfly house with butterflies that fly during the day, and at the other end of the greenhouses was the moths that fly at night. Of course we didn't get to see many moths as it was daylight when we visited, but here are 2 examples that were resting. If these 2 were anything to go by, the moths can certainly give the butterflies a run for their money in terms of sheer spectacle.

The Cobra Moth (Attacus atlas). Native to South East Asia, the Cobra moth is considered one of the largest in the world. It is a silk producing moth which This moth has no mouth parts and only lives for 1-2 weeks. Just enough time to reproduce.

Cercropia moth (Hyalophora cecropia). The largest of the North American moths, it too has no mouth parts and lives for 7 to 10 days.

P.S. To enlarge a picture, simply click once on it (thanks to my clever husband for filling me in on that little secret).

Stairway to Heaven - Part 2

We've looked at one set of steps that came with the lot. There is also another set that goes down past the Lake Lookout Garden to the dock.  We call them the Dock Stairs (perhaps if prizes were awarded for imagination we might have put more effort into naming them).  These are also very old, but despite the fact that they are falling apart they are still serviceable.

Here is the base of the dock stairs.

P.S. I'm having a few technical difficulties today, so this post is still to be continued. Rest assured, we'll get to the top of the stairs in another post.


These steps don't exist anymore. They were so rickety, they were removed (much to my chagrin). 
Notice the way that tree seems to be growing in a crack in the rock. It's one of the younger oaks).



Here's a view of the dock stairs from the side. 
Note the lovely big rock in the background. That's where we moved one of the cinder blocks to.



And here's a view of the stairs from the front. It's hard to see, but the steps are made of sawn off lengths of railway ties. There's lots of wild grass (which is probably sedge rather than grass) growing in between, and there have been known to be yellow jackets nesting underneath - makes for exciting journeys up and down the stairs!
Note the shady spot at the top. It's always lovely and cool there and you can sit and survey the lake.

The Garden Database - by David Kelly

When I think of the hours of toil and frustration that I have spent so far in the creation of my Gardening database, I have, from time to time, questioned my motives. What really is the point of this complexity? Who in their right mind would go to this trouble if they weren’t being paid? As far as I can figure, it was born purely of my own necessity. The garden would obviously flourish or perish regardless of a database. Much of it boiled down to my lovely wife, to whose standards I felt compelled to rise.

You see my wife is British by birth, and still retains her accent. Months and months before we had even met face-to-face, having only spoken by phone, she had lured me in with her lovely accent and her obvious intelligence. While the accent alone is lovely, when spoken with Gardener’s Latin, the combination can be intimidating. Thus it seemed to me there was a necessity to rise to her level. I couldn’t do anything about the accent, but I could certainly expand my lexicon to encompass some Latin taxonomy. With the database, the correct botanical names for our garden specimens are right at my fingertips.

My wife also has a better memory than me, or at least sets the standard to which my memory is to be measured! With a database, we can agree on the facts, they can be meticulously recorded and yet retrieved in an instant. In the years before the database I would struggle and be frustrated trying to remember from year to year where a particular specimen was planted. For even with our modest beginnings, we had five different planting sights.

A final necessity, for which my wife can claim no credit, is satisfy my meticulous nature. I do love the minutia of collecting the details and presenting them in a consistent and professional format. Digging through some old gardening materials, I recently came across some lists and journals that I had made as a teenager back in the early 80’s. I’ve always been this way, now it just looks more sophisticated.

These were plans, notes and journal entries from my parents garden in Montreal in the 80's

This is the homepage of the database that I have created now. A place to house all sorts of garden related data.

A sample Specimen record from the garden database.

Spring!

Twice a week I have a lovely walk to work. I guess I should explain that sentence. As a bookkeeper I have clients in many different locations. I like it that way. It means I'm never bored.  Twice a week I go east to see a client in Leslieville and I've grown to enjoy the little walk between the streetcar stop and the office.

It's a strange neighbourhood. As it is still somewhat reasonable, it has undergoing some gentrification and this is evident as many of the little semi-detached homes are being renovated, often showing signs of an architect's influence.  Some have gardens that are little gems. Lawns still exist, but are getting smaller and smaller.

Spring has come early this year, and we had 2 weeks of over 20 degree temperatures. Gardens have exploded with blooms. And of course it was followed by a 20 degree drop in temperature. Some of the buds have been blasted by the cold, but at least it has slowed down the blooming to a more sedate pace. Perhaps the Spring will last a bit longer now before erupting into summer.

Here are a few of the gardens along my walk.

This is a lovely little elevated front garden. The urn usually has something seasonal in it, and there's a very nice topiaried cedar. You can see some pale blue Chinodox in the foreground and there's actually a helleborus behind the urn.

Right next door is this charming little garden.

It doesn't matter what time of year, this garden is packed with flowers. I'm not sure how they get everything in. At the end of last year, when most gardens had long finished, this garden had a late blooming Aconitum (Monkshood ) snuggling up to the dried flowers of a Hydrangea that had turned a beautiful coppery colour. It was sensational. I also love the playful and very creative handmade trellis. This is one of my favorite gardens on my walk, and I look forward to seeing what has come up.

This delightful postage sized front yard is packed with plants.

 There's a weeping larch (perhaps Larix decidua pendula) in front of the air-conditioning unit, that's just starting to leaf out. Next to it is a burgundy Helleborus niger. In front of it there's a tiny flowering quince (Chaenomeles) that's just budding out. Chaenomeles are very early bloomers. Watch out when you see Forsythia in bloom, Chaenomoles are not far behind. There are also some interesting dwarf evergreens. I can see a thread leaf cypress Chamaecyparis, and a small Juniper. I think I also spotted a rose, a tiny leaved Euonymus, and even some Vinca Minor. And there's even some bare ground, that I'm sure will sprout some surprises as the season progresses. Note the problematic garbage pails, that are Mayor Miller's legacy to the City of Toronto. Now every household has to have 3 separate garbage receptacles to put their garbage into for pick up. They are huge and unsightly. I'm glad I don't have to deal with them!

Here's a close up so you can see the individual plants better.

 Here are a few more gardens from the next street over. I don't walk down this street regularly, but it was a nice day and as I had the camera with me I took the opportunity to snap some gardens that interested me.

This is an obvious renovation. The large grasses compliment the design. I think they are Miscanthus sinensis "Gracillimus"

I sense a landscaper designer's hand in this little garden. Multiple plantings of sculptural plants and lots of mulch.  I think it may develop more interest as the year progresses.

I can definitely see the Landscaper's hand in this one! Lovely clean lines.

I love Forsythia. It is one of the best harbinger's of Spring.  There's also a lovely drift wood bench here behind the daffodils.  The garden would benefit from some screening as the ubiquitous garbage receptacles really detract from the over all effect.

This lovely garden is on a corner lot. The photo doesn't do it justice. There are some lovely evergreen's here. Let's hope they're all slow growing!

Here's the same garden from the corner. I'm not sure about the scale of the grasses (probably Calamagrostis acutiflora "Karl Forester"). The plants are very close to the house, and seem a bit dominant, but the curly willow is sensational here. Once again, there are at least 3 conifers that I can see - all cheek by jowl in a very narrow space.

I hope you've enjoyed walking to work with me. I'll repeat the process later on when the summer gardens have started.