Enjoy the Oslo Riverfront Conservation Area
440 acres adjacent to the Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory, University of Florida/IFAS
Diversity matters - at least to monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus). Milkweeds (Asclepias spp.) are the larval host plants for monarch butterfly. Pictured above along Oslo Road is a monarch butterfly nectaring on scarlet milkweed (Asclepias curassavica), a non-native, commercially available…
Spurred butterfly pea (Centrosema virginianum) is a perennial herbaceous vine that is occasionally found growing at Oslo Riverfront Conservation Area (ORCA) and is pictured above engulfing bushy bluestem (Andropogon glomeratus) at Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge (PINWR). Sometimes you will…
You’ll see lots of zebra longwing butterflies in the shady hammock loop area at ORCA …
Heliconius charithonia
What’s going on back there under the passionvine foliage? Look closely…there are two Zebra Longwing Butterflies all a flutter, and a chrysalis. We’ll come back to that after some fun context.
Florida may claim it as our state butterfly, but so could Caribbean Islands and nations all the way into South America. The Zebras need passionvines for their hungry caterpillars, so I’ll guess without data that the butterfly’s range is related to that of the genus Passiflora. My wife Donna and I have several species of passionvines in our butterfly garden where experience shows the Longwings have their preferred species, such as Corkystem. When the caterpillars get on a bender along with Gulf Fritillaries, they can make short work of passion-foliage. I’ve never seen this written anywhere, but to my eye, these colorful butterflies darken into shadows in the shade, which they like to haunt…
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Juba's bush (Iresine diffusa) is easily to overlook until it flowers. The genus name, Iresine, is thought to be derived from the Greek word eiros, which means wool. The species name, diffusa, means loosely spreading. Both the genus and species…
