Hey friends! 

This week I’ve got a bonus butterfly tale for you, I’m really very excited about this one!!

Over the last couple of months I’ve been raising a grand total of 61 Red Admiral butterflies and during that time I’ve dug up many, many nettle plants for them to eat. When they start to pupate I like to add a fresh plant or two so that when they emerge there is a nice, new host plant for them to (hopefully) lay more eggs on.

At one point I had 6 Red ads pupating in a house of their own and after a few days I noticed the nettle I had prepared for them was being eaten, well, it turned out to have an occupant! One lone Comma caterpillar was quite happily eating its way through my new nettle.

Comma (Polygonia c-album) is another of our native butterflies, its one of the quirkiest looking ones we have here. They have scalloped wing edges which with the dark markings on the undersides of its wings camouflage it to resemble a dead leaf! 

They mainly breed in woodland so I’m really pleased to have found one in the garden.

Comma have a flexible life cycle and can breed later in the season – although I’ve never seen one of their caterpillars this late in the year. From a conservation point of view these butterflies are awfully clever as they suffered a severe decline in the twentieth century but have increased their numbers and are now widespread across the country.

Its quite a pretty caterpillar, it has such cute antennae. I totally fell in love with him and (stupidly) named in Clive – I got way too attached to the little fella.

Obviously its time for my usual disclaimer…

I’m only rescuing the ones I can identify as eggs as some caterpillars can be tricky to raise or are protected species. If I don’t trust that I can look after them properly and give them the right food plant/proper environment then my plan is always to just leave them alone.

Usually I would let him go, but to be honest it’s now the beginning of November and he should pretty much go straight into hibernation until early next year. Actually quite a few of my remaining Red ads (30 of them) have shut down for winter already, its so nice to be the custodian of as many little lives as I am over the cold season, these butterflies all like to hibernate among dead leaves so I’ve been drying them for just this reason! I also rescued the last 19 my Large whites in September the day before they started to pupate – they won’t emerge until next year (plus another 15 eggs I found on the 28/9 – I’m having to buy cabbages to feed them!!) and some other exciting ones to share with you once they (hopefully) emerge next year.

Next summer I might have to do a post about my butterfly house!

I really hope you enjoyed this little bonus slice of fluttery goodness! I feel super privileged to have been able to care for so many caterpillars this year. 

As always thank you so much for reading this post and have a great week!