Two Monarch Caterpillars

Apparently, I like to grow sticks.

Being where I am, there are Monarch Butterflies around me all year.  Wilton Manors, Florida seems to have a thing about turning itself into a nature habitat.  I'm near a park that is a nature preserve, the M. E. DePalma Park. 

I'm lucky that it is handy, that park, because I walk past it frequently looking for seeds for more Milkweed.  I've got to borrow some more.  Monarchs are back. 

They seem to know.  When the Milkweed just puts forth a flower, I notice them fluttering by my porch looking for a place to lay eggs.  I make it a point to go out back and look at my pots and sure enough under a leaf there is a grain of sand.

Monarch Butterfly eggs are about the size of a grain of sand and have a swirled pattern on top like a Chinese Bun. 

The flowers never really come to term.  I almost never get seeds.   The park does, although usually about the time that the park is down to sticks, I sneak in some flowers and may even get a seed or three out of them.

We trade back and forth. 

At this point I'm down to sticks.

Orchids are in bloom.

I have a pot of Poinsettia that is hip high, and I am 6'4" tall.  It is in bloom.

My Coleus is running amok, even if I am recycling this and most of these pictures...

I have Podocarpus ready to plant.

I have red variegated Hibiscus ready to plant.

But that Mexican Milkweed?  That's what it is there for.  Food for the Monarchs.  The last time I checked there were six caterpillars on one single plant.   Those plants won't win.

Oh well, at least the Monarchs are happy and I have pictures of some that slipped in there when they weren't watching last time!