I love seeing butterflies of all varieties in the garden. Munching caterpillars are not usually quite as welcome… For baby monarchs, however, I happily make an exception. This post is an index of our favourite monarch-friendly gardening posts from the Green in Real Life blog archives. If you’re keen to help the caterpillar, butterflies, or both with your own monarch-friendly home garden, check out the links below. They’re full of monarch-related information, our own garden activities and lessons learned, and helpful monarch gardening tips. And awesome monarch pics!
Supporting Monarchs in the Home Garden
There’s something marvellous and magical about the monarchs, isn’t there? Caterpillars are normally an annoying scourge to be deterred in the garden, Monarch babies, however, are invited and pampered. I even have sections of the garden especially for them, with fancy little protective nets and other garden gadgets. Wasps are something I’d normally scurry away from, but for my monarchs, I go into baby protecting battle-mode. If you know, you know. Nature can be cruel.
The linked posts below are an index collection of favourites from our special monarch gardening mini-series, shared here on the blog over our recent monarch season. They’re full of photos of our monarchs at different stages of development, monarch-friendly gardening tips, and more.
Planning and Planting a Monarch Friendly Garden
The Monarch Life Cycle
- Monarch Mating and Egg Laying
- Hatching and Caterpillar Development
- Forming a Chrysalis for Metamorphosis
- Eclosing as an Adult Monarch Butterfly
Supporting Monarch Caterpillars in the Garden
Farewell for the Season from the Monarch Garden
Our coldest part of the year is currently fast approaching here in New Zealand, but happy first week of summer to our northern friends and readers! It’s a perfect time for you to be planning, plotting, and planting your butterfly-friendly garden additions.
In our cooling weather, it’s mostly time for dreaming of next season and saying a few final afrewells. This lovely little guy was the last (to my knowledge) monarch butterfly to hatch in our garden for the cycle this year. It was a rather damp and chilly autumn arrival in the world, so I offered him a lift. He happily hopped a ride on a flower from the shelter where he had emerged into the sunshine for warm up before flying away. A special farewell indeed.
How do I know this is a little guy butterfly and not a little gal? The easiest way to tell the differerence between a male and female monarch butterfly is to spot the dots (or not). Those two small black dots on the inner portion of the hindwings near the tail end of the body are how I know this newly eclosed young monarch butterfly is male. They’re scent glands for pheromones. Hello there, ladies!
Other differences, like thinner black veins or stronger orange colouring on males, can be difficult to judge for a casual observer, especially without another butterfly for comparison. Looks for the dots for an easy way to tell male from female.
