More Greetings from Hershey's Butterfly House!

Yesterday was not the most fun of afternoons I've had at the butterfly house. 3 casualties on my watch. THREE. I was beyond upset and trying not to let it show, after all they were accidents. Dumb accidents but nevertheless. Since the butterfly house is located in the Children's Garden, it has obvious appeal to most kids. I say most because plenty of children are NOT fond of butterflies at all. But most are. You would think that it might be grabby toddlers who you have to watch out for... but no. It's the photographers.... The adults.

I'm usually standing near the entrance on the inside of the butterfly house so if any butterflies are lying along the bricks (which, to my dismay, seems to be their favorite damn place to be), I can point them out with a word of caution to everyone who enters: "Be careful where you step because the butterflies do like to lay around on the walkway. They blend in easily if you're not looking for them. They're also fast, so while I'm trying to watch for them and let you know if you're near one, sometimes they land too quickly for me to warn people." I also attempt to get the butterflies move off the walkway, but they can be stubborn little things and will fly right back to where they were basking and refuse to land elsewhere...

So I'll point them out to people, sometimes more than once, and even so... you get someone taking photos, or just off in la-la land. They make a beeline for a butterfly who is minding its own business warming itself on the sunny walkway. I'll point out the butterfly to the person and say "Oh.. hey...Watch out..." and not once, not twice, but THREE times yesterday the person was completely oblivious... and, splat. Hellllooooo?? You're the only person within 10 feet of me! Who, exactly, did you think I was talking to when I started walking toward YOU and said "Oh, hey, watch out!"


At the end of the afternoon yesterday, I had a visitor that seemed like he really wanted to come home with me! I let him hang on for about 30 minutes but I finally had to try and get to my car before the heavy rains came... unfortunately I was about 2 minutes too late and had to wait it out for about 40 minutes. Ugh! But I did get a few great pics earlier in the afternoon...

Here we have a White Peacock on a Black Eyed Susan. I spent a lot of time yesterday trying to get some good photos of the butterflies' faces. A lot of butterfly pictures are taken from above, with their beautiful wings exposed, or from the side while their wings are folded up behind them. Those are great photos for obvious reasons, but like a lot of bugs, butterflies have quite cute (and silly) faces. You don't get to see them that often, but I think I got a good one of this guy here :)


These two are a Buckeye butterfly. It's too bad the photos don't really do them justice... in the sun, their wings have so many bright colors. There are pinks, purples, blues- but usually in photos, the oranges and browns seem to be all that show up. Those are pretty on their own, but the iridescence is really quite impressive when you can get a good look at it.