Cardiff Garden Blog

A few years back my friend planted a milkweed plant in his garden box in our backyard.  That plant birthed willow like spores that spread among the other garden boxes.  Milkweed is a favorite food source for Monarch butterflies.  So ever since then we have seen plenty orbiting the plants.   This is a picture of the flowers the plants produce.   The striped caterpillars are all Monarch happily munching away. The plants themselves will recover from their leave stripping.  How many do you count in this photo?   You should then expect to see these guys hanging in different places around your garden. These are the chrysalis to which the butterflies will hatch from.  I actually found one on a house plant I put outside for a week and after moving the plant back inside the butterfly hatched in my living room.   Having milkweed in your garden affords you these great opportunities to get up and close views of the beautiful butterflies.   I helped relocate this gu