A Different Kind of Butterfly House

Butterfly houses are great places to observe and learn about butterflies. Another stop during our visit to southwest Michigan was a butterfly house at the Sarett Nature Center. Most of the butterfly houses I have visited contain tropical species that we would never see in our American gardens. This butterfly house is different. It housed butterfly species native to North America.

This butterfly house serves as an educational center to local residence, student summer camps, and school field trips by showing them what butterfly species they can attract to their gardens, what nectar plants work best in this region as well as butterflies that they can find in other parts of North America. The butterfly house and plants are made possible by grants from several local organizations and donations.

The butterfly house is a net structure so the conditions inside the butterfly house are the same as outside. Fortunately for us, it had rained that morning and then the sun came out making it humid and sunny. Perfect flight conditions for the butterflies. And they were very active.

I was enamored with a few species that are native to North America but not species I would see in my home garden. The white peacock butterfly's strong hold is in south Florida and Texas where the conditions are more tropical. They are not particularly strong fliers and are less hardy than their cousin the buckeye, which is one I often see in my garden.

white peacock butterfly

Can you see the relation?

buckeye butterfly

Another butterfly found in south Florida is the Julia. It shares the same host plant, passionvine, with the Zebra Heliconian and Gulf Fritillary butterflies.

Julia Butterfly

The Zebra Longwing is another butterfly that is found from southern Florida over to Texas. At night large groups of Zebra longwings roost together on tree limbs.

Zebra longwing

The nature center has a limited license through the U.S. Department of Agriculture. This licensing only allows them to have butterflies and these butterflies are not to be released outside the enclosure. That is why there aren't any host plants in the exhibit. But, this doesn't seem to stop the butterflies from trying.

butterflies mating

The nature center orders chrysalis every two weeks from May through the first week of September. Visitors can view the chrysalis through a window. While we were there the docent allowed my children to release some butterflies that had emerged from their chrysalis.

releasing a buckeye butterfly

releasing a Julia butterfly

In addition to nectar plants there are several nectar stations throughout the exhibit. These are made up of a natural sponge soaked in sugar water (4 parts water to 1 part sugar) with a splash of red Gatorade. Apparently, the butterflies like the minerals in the Gatorade drink and, according to the docent, they have tried other colors such as orange Gatorade and red is the favorite.

Oddly, some of the butterflies were very attracted to my son's feet. Not sure if they liked the stinky smell or just the color blue. We had to be very careful walking around because lots of the butterflies hung around in the gravel paths.

This was my first time seeing a Queen butterfly. It is a beautiful chestnut brown color and the white spots reminded me of the monarch butterflies. Like the monarch, Queens use milkweed as a host plant too.

Queen butterfly

One of my favorite swallowtails is the Giant Swallowtail and this one looks like it has been pretty beat up by the weather. It must be challenging to be such a big butterfly trying to maneuver in the winds and rain.

Overall, I was very impressed with this exhibit, although it was heart breaking to see the butterflies trying to reproduce knowing what the outcome would be. This exhibit serves to educate and encourage people to create and preserve the native butterfly habitat which needs all the assistance it can get.