Butterfly days and Summer memories

                                                         Butterflies                                




A little girl with shiny long hair years ago would run through the orchard looking up at the sky and have a big black butterfly try to land on her head and that would be me. I now know years later they were called Mourning cloaks and are known as the friendly gentle butterfly.




                                      Trying to take a picture of a butterfly.

I love butterflies because of that I plant bushes that will attract them to my garden. Butterflies also need to have plants to be used as host plants to deposit their eggs.My purple butterfly bush that is blooming has butterflies enjoying the nectar every day. I also bought another bush that has attracted butterflies the bush is called a milkweed .Monarchs need  the milkweed plant so the larvae can eat it as it develops on this plant. It’s a host plant and if you want monarchs head for the nursery. Today with the heat of summer bearing down I am being sure to water my plants and that’s when these beautiful graceful ballerinas come out influenced by a wet drink to soothe their parched wings I tried to sit quietly today near the milkweed and I could see the butterfly but never catch it in a picture. It eluded me and teased me with its getting close to the milkweed then flying away rapidly. Frustrating as it was I realized how hard it is to be still and wait.





 There is a monarch in the milkweed bush look closely!
I caught it in my photo.








 I need to weed yikes!

  When I was a little girl my parents had a orchard in our backyard with twenty seven fruit trees. When I would go out the back door I would look out at the arbor that lead to the orchard and to this world of fully mature fruit trees. There were almond trees, peach trees, fig trees, nectarines and lemon trees. I remember stooping and playing under the ripe plum trees while picking fruit. .The memories of running through the orchard with my brothers and picking tangerines from a tree that seem to age better with neglect are still fresh in my mind on a hot summer day.I am embarrassed to recall putting my little brothers in large leaf trash cans and pushing them down our little hill in the orchard over and over again. Every year we would have bags of tangerines from this constant steady reliable tree.
Today I noticed two mourning cloaks butterflies were in the garage in front of our big window that looks out to the garden and were stuck unable to get out of the garage. Between the cobwebs and the chance of freedom a look away they were not going anywhere. They were beautiful and I of course had to rescue them. I climbed all over the place practically breaking my neck with the pieces of wood my husband has leaning against the wall. They fluttered away, I kept talking to them they listened I am sure but were not impressed just scared to be trapped in the garage. Finally they settled down wings together against the large window and I grabbed the wings delicately with my fingers. Off one went over the top of the roof and then the next one was caught and flew away just as rapidly. Now I have mourning cloaks watching me as I putter in my garden. Mourning cloaks live for a year and so these two are my new garden buddies for the year. Cheri