This beautiful Orange Sulfur butterfly was flitting from Zinnia to Zinnia at my home here on Cape Cod. I have never seen one before.
Orange Sulfur butterflies are about 2″ in wingspan. They are overall yellow with bright orange and black wing borders- solid in males and broken in females. They have 1-2 red-ringed spots on their hindwings.
Have you ever seen an Orange Sulfur butterfly? Pretty, don’t you think?
I haven’t seen very many butterflies this summer to photograph here on Cape Cod. There have been some very pretty ones but they never alight on a flower to take a picture.
Phil and I were talking the other day about photographing these elusive butterflies. First you have to see a butterfly, then you have to follow it, then it has to land on something and then you have to be ready to take that quick photograph before it flies away again. Chances of all of these things going right are not that easy.
Thus…the elusive butterfly photograph.
This Little Copper butterfly landed on one of the Daisies in my yard and proceded take make a full circle on the flower. It was perfect. I got every angle imaginable. Only problem was, I only had my phone, not my camera. And my phone does not take a macro as well as my camera.
But…what do you think?
I have never seen a Black Swallowtail before it landed on one of my Zinnias in my backyard yesterday. I happened to see it out of the corner of my eye so I ran and got my camera and clicked away. He was just beautiful.
The Black Swallowtail is a large butterfly with its wingspan up to 3.5″. It is mostly black with iridescent blue on its hindwings and rows of yellow with an orange eyespot. You can in the 2 photographs how different it looks with its wings open and closed.
So pretty, don’t you think?
I planted a lot of flowers in my yard here on Cape Cod to try to attract the butterflies and hummingbirds. This White Cabbage butterfly liked my Zinnias the best!
A White Cabbage butterfly is about 1 and 5/8″ with black on its forewing tips. The male has one black spot and the female has 2 black spots, so this is a female.
After she had her fill of the Zinnias, she alighted on the rock slab at the base of our bird bath and spread her wings, showing her true colors.
Pretty butterfly, don’t you think?
I was taking a walk at Fort Hill, looking for new birds, wildflowers and butterflies to photograph. This pretty Pearl Crescent landed on the trail right in front of me and then I saw a pair of them on a clover down the ways a bit.
Pearl Crescent butterflies are orange with black borders, scattered black markings and a wingspan of 1- 1 1/2 “. Their habitat is fields and meadows which is exactly what Fort Hill has to offer.
Pretty little butterflies, don’t you think? I had never seen this one before!
