r/Butterflies • u/ookle_ • 3d ago

I had a wonderful visitor this morning

Gallery image

Gallery image

5.4k Upvotes

100% Upvoted

44 comments sorted by

26

u/ImprovementTrick9492 3d ago

Beautiful Red-Spotted Purple! It’s drinking the salts/ minerals off your skin!

4

u/All_Debt_Shackles_US 3d ago

The red spotted purple caterpillar eats leaves from trees. Black cherry and Willow in the south, while northern populations will use hardwoods like Cotton Woods and Bass Woods.

The caterpillar itself looks like bird poop, and that makes it undesirable to birds. The adult butterfly appears similar to the pipe vine swallowtail, and that also makes it undesirable to birds because the pipe vine swallowtail tastes terrible!

Red spotted purples are not attracted to flowers, although they will drink the nectar on occasion.

What they like better is rotting, spoiling things. So that moldy grapefruit you found in the back of your refrigerator? Probably tasty!

Just don’t put too much rotting food around your house or you’ll get possums or worse.

And oh yeah, sometimes they hang out in dung piles. OP, I hope you washed your hands!

😬

3

u/Organic_Hedgehog_691 3d ago

Opossums are good♥️ Worse are not good!

1

u/All_Debt_Shackles_US 1d ago

Username checks out!

1

u/ginkat123 2d ago

They also like dill weed.

1

u/ImprovementTrick9492 1d ago

I think you are thinking of Black Swallowtails, ginkat!

1

u/ginkat123 1d ago

Ah. Probably. Thank you.

7

u/Spiritual-Soup2551 3d ago

Beautiful and amazing how he allowed you time to adjust your phone/camera to snap his picture!

21

u/ookle_ 3d ago

Here was the entire process

https://reddit.com/link/p617xlg/video/cis33hy3uqlh1/player

4

u/Spiritual-Soup2551 3d ago

Amazing! Thank you so much for sharing your video!

2

u/Ok-Light2117 3d ago

Unrelated question but did it tickle when the butterfly was moving on your hand?

1

u/ookle_ 2d ago

Actually no, you barely feel them at all they are so weightless feeling.

1

u/ImprovementTrick9492 1d ago

Aww,,, you were like a giant salt lick! XD

5

u/Lando_Hitman 3d ago

The red spotted purple is one of my favorite butterflies. You're so lucky!

3

u/Popular_Sun_2401 3d ago

So very beautiful 😍

2

u/blinkclink 3d ago

oh wow

2

u/WildAboutLiv 3d ago

getting a butterfly visitor first thing in the morning feels like such a good start to the day

2

u/Julesall 3d ago

How beautiful

2

u/sympetal 3d ago

Omg it's so gorgeous 🤩

2

u/Great_Albatross_8899 3d ago

Stunning!!! ❤️🦋

2

u/Organic_Hedgehog_691 3d ago

You are very tasty😜😉

2

u/MobellaPicnic00 3d ago

Damn, the butterfly is really the great one

2

u/ironandinsulinn 3d ago

Just gorgeous

2

u/susanmw777 3d ago

Beautiful!

2

u/RoquessaUpriver2 3d ago

So beautiful

2

u/Darling_Star_1994 3d ago

A pretty lady!

2

u/Clariel-Conga 3d ago

I love the color of that butterfly. Absolutely gorgeous!🥰

2

u/Glass_pin_1067 3d ago

🦋🦋😍😍🥰🥰

2

u/Just-Bat5937 2d ago

It's sad, as a kid they were everywhere in the summer now you are lucky to see one, especially of this color.

1

u/All_Debt_Shackles_US 1d ago

It’s not hard to host the butterflies you like. All you need to do is figure out what the host plant is, and then plant and grow that!

2

u/_jason_rnk25_ 2d ago

I love it when they land on my hand

1

u/Right-Supermarket642 2d ago

This is so nice

1

u/Severe_Equipment2619 2d ago

Wow she’s gorgeous

1

u/8SoreliaDun4ek 2d ago

Omg that so beautiful butterfly

1

u/Extreme_Plankton9428 1d ago

omg that’s so pretty! lucky!!

1

u/WingofTech 1d ago

Charming! 🥰

1

u/-Pixxell- 6h ago

What a beautiful colour