Butterflies visiting my garden

I love beautiful insects and butterflies that visit my garden. Butterflies can be so beautiful with all their different colors and I am always amazed how they can fly with such a fragile wing and also the metamorphosis is very interesting. Changing from the catapilar into the pupa and then into the finished butterfly. I like these insects because of their beautiful colors. And there are so many different species with different colors and patterns.

Some of the butterflies have favorite plants and feed on the nectar of only a few plant species. They help to polinate different plants because they visit the blossom of a plant speices and fly from one to another and therefore pollinate them by carying the pollen from one plant to the other. Like bees they are a very important part of the ecosystem.

Butterflies and moths undergo complete metamorphosis. The larva is called a caterpillar; it has a cylindrical body with a well-developed head, chewing mouthparts, three pairs of legs and up to five pairs of prolegs. As it grows, it changes in appearance, going through a series of stages called instars. Once mature, it develops into a pupa. A few butterflies and many moth species spin a silk casing or cocoon for protection prior to pupating, while others just go underground. A butterfly pupa, called a chrysalis, has a hard skin, usually with no cocoon. In the pupa, metamorphosis occurs, and a sexually mature adult emerges. - Source: Wikipedia