Gardens-In-The-Sand

Some late season caterpillars

Caterpillars are an integral part of any butterfly garden, but ortho has the world conned into thinking that all caterpillars are bad.

There are some bad caterpillars, like the squash vine borer (SVB). Get an infestation of these, and either perform surgery on the injured plants, or wave good-bye to the crop.

Very bad news indeed! The SVB lives inside of the vine and/or fruit, and kills the plant.

The long-tailed skipper is less problematic, this caterpillar eats a leaf or two, and becomes a beautiful butterfly. I suppose there's always the option of removing the little caterpillars to one of their usual host plants like the spurred butterfly pea pictured below.

The long-tailed skipper butterfly

Caterpillars on the coffee weed. No worries, I grow coffee weed (Senna obtusifolia)for the sulfur yellow butterflies...

The coffee weed is an attractive, interesting plant, the leaves fold at night like a sensitive plant.

Buckeye caterpillar on agalinas purpurea.

Creepy looking caterpillars feasting on the pokeweed.

I'm not having any luck tracking down an id on these pokeweed caterpillars, after several pages of google results, I'm ready to ask for help in identification... Does nebody know what they are?

Pokeweed berries.

Gulf fritillary caterpillar

Gulf fritillary butterfly

As usual, I have too many pictures to post, I'll have to save the purdy wildflower pictures for my next post...

Summer visitors

This gopher tortoise was hanging out in the drive, and made no effort to move until after I got out of the truck to photograph him.
The state reptile of Georgia, these guys lend cool factor to the garden.

Indigo bunting, is this guy blue enough for you?

The cow killers are colorful too.
I walk around bare-footed, but I don't think I'd want to step on one of these guys for more reasons than concerns for the critter...

The hummingbirds are adorable.

Manduca rustica caterpillar shows his close kinship to the tomato hornworm.
Feeding on vitex (chaste tree), which I'm willing to share... He crawled off and did whatever shortly after posing for this photo shoot.

Tiny Red-banded Hairstreak butterfly visiting the verbesina

GBBD August

The Garden Bloggers Bloom Day is such a neat concept, and I always want to post something... getting the pics on the right day is spotty...

The Front Yard

Butterfly pea (Centrosema virginianum), makes a nice display...

These little dayflowers (Commelina erecta var. angustifolia), are cute, they're a very different critter than the usual dayflower... which plagues a flower-bed, covers the ground... rooting at every joint.

St. Andrew's cross

Garden Spider

wild sweet potato

Prarie Broomweed (Amphiachyris dracunculoides)

This yard is completely unvisited by the lawn mower... I hate those things!

There's a lot of trouble in the suburban front yard, Neighbors who want to dictate the acceptable appearance of the yard, and I feel bad for them, I think mine is ever so much nicer!

The Garden

Hyacinth bean in bloom

The clasping heliotrope continues to attract butterflies... I have a patch of low-growing lantana next to the heliotrope, and this plant out-competes the lantana!

Swamp hibiscus... Not the best choice in a sand hill garden...
While I can keep these things alive, they seldom look like anything here.

An interesting combination, silphium astericus and apple mint in bloom, with bumble bee.

Sulphur yellow butterfly visits salvia coccinea, Let's not tell the humming birds, k?

Zinnia and gulf fritillaries.

Tiger swallowtail and zinnia.

The butterflies found the tithonia!

Happy full moon

I didn't think to shoot the moon last evening... but I did take lots of garden pics yesterday afternoon...

After a bit of rain, the lantana has put on a flush of new bloom.

To go with all the new blooms, there seems to be a fresh hatch of butterflies...

Painted ladies...

The clear-wing sphinx moth (Hemaris thysbe) is always exciting!

The spicebush swallowtail is abundant...

Gulf Fritillary

Tiger swallowtail

The butterflies haven't found it yet... the tithonia has begun to bloom...

Red chenille (Acalypha hispida), is a new flower to this garden... brought it in last Autumn, most people grow it as a house plant... will see how winter hardy, and how drought tolerant this plant is... seems like red chenille would make a good turf replacement...