March 22 The butterflies are bloomin!

Monday at Frederick Meijer Gardens:  I'm so glad I made time to visit the Gardens early this morning to see what was going on with the butterflies. I go to the "Butterflies are Bloomin" exhibit every year hoping to get some remarkable photos of the beautiful butterflies. The pictures I'm posting today are NOT stunning or anything ... most of my favorite butterflies have not yet been released into the habitat but are still "growing" in their little enclosures ...

I arrived to the entrance of the Gardens at 8:50 to get in line. I'm glad I arrived that early because there is always a crowd that comes to see the butterflies -- and since I try to get decent photos of the butterflies, it works best when I don't have to crop people's heads and arms out of the pictures. Due to COVID, though, they are only letting 70 people in the habitat at a time--I guess that's the first GOOD thing I've found about COVID since it began!

The line to the butterflies goes through the dessert exhibit. I passed by this flower named "Crown of Thorns" and other than the fact that it is RED, I cannot for the life of me figure out why it is named this. I intend to find out!

You have to walk through a screened-in area to get to the butterflies. I really only saw 3 or 4 different kinds of butterflies today--most of the Postman variety. They are pretty, but I don't think they are exceptionally beautiful ...

Here is the enclosure where the crysallis's are hanging. Many of the Blue Morphos have hatched--these are one of my very favorite butterflies ...

I forget the exact name of the ones below ... "Tiger" perhaps ... I love these ones too.

The ones hanging (below) are moths and they are my favoritest favorite because they are SO amazing and quite huge actually.

That's all for now. I'll certainly try to return on another SUNNY morning ... the butterflies are most active on a sunny day. Perhaps a few days from now when I am not otherwise occupied ...