I wasn't born a gardener. Neither of my thumbs were green. But when I discovered my love for creating art from flowers and nature, I had no choice but to plant a garden. I didn't know a pansy from a petunia back then. I am still learning. I have come to love my garden, with all of it's faults. One of the things I enjoy most are finding things I am not looking for.
Today was finally the perfect day to do some garden clean up. While I was ripping out unwanted weeds, and thinning through over grown wild things I spotted first, just one Black Swallowtail caterpillar (larva).
While in past years I have had one, maybe two of the interesting caterpillars on my fennel plant, I had never seen one this young. I have only seen them when they are green. At first I wasn't sure it was a
swallowtail, but knew I would research it later.
Then while my ripping out of unwanted things continued, I reached down to pull some fennel that was sprouting but instead found two more of these caterpillars.
I went in to the computer to clarify that these were indeed swallowtail larvae, some, maybe just a few days old. Then I thought of all of the Queen Anne's Lace and Fennel I had discarded. Sure enough after an hour of carefully inspecting it all I rescued three more larvae.
This is also a Black Swallowtail larva, in an older stage than the small black ones.
My garden was a fun place to be on this cloudy day. I had so many visitors.
There were two of these monarch butterflies on the bush, enjoying all of the new blooms
He's hiding there, knowing he is not allowed in the garden!