Thursday, June 25, 2015

Aye, aye, admiral

Some years there are butterflies in my yard, and some years there aren't. This year we have a plethora of Red Admirals, aka Vanessa cardui (Linnaeus). I read somewhere that they like thistle blossoms, which is too bad; last weekend we frantically yanked up all the Canada thistle because it was starting to bloom. Fortunately, Red Admirals like other flowers as well, including Scabiosa (I think this is 'Butterfly Blue').


The only other butterflies I have seen are Cabbage Whites (Pieris rapae), never a welcome sight.

1 comment:

Jason said...

We have a few red admirals also. Their host plants are in the nettle family. Fortunately there is a false nettle without stinging hairs that is still a host plant, though not really ornamental. Odd thing about red admirals is they sometimes land on my shirt to drink sweat for the salt. Also they make me think of Sean Connery in The Hunt for Red October.