Butterfly Collection

While on my “Minnie” vacation last weekend, I took a long walk one morning and snapped this picture. My mom used to call these little guys “moths,” but it is actually a fine specimen of the Cabbage White Butterfly or the Pieris rapae. For those of you who didn’t know, I’m sort of nuts about butterflies.

It all began back on the farm growing up. My sister Becky (eight years my senior) had a small field guide on butterflies and moths. Following its how-to section on the capture, killing, and mounting of these colorful winged insects, she amassed an impressive collection. She displayed them in a wooden box with a glass cover my dad made for her. The butterfly net she used was carefully crafted out of an old broom handle, a wire clothes hanger, and a worn out piece of cheese cloth. It seems to me she did little else each summer than work toward her objective of catching, killing and displaying one of every butterfly indigenous to our area. And I, acting as her eager assistant, followed her around, lending a hand where I could, cheering her on all the while.

As a grownup I tried to pass this hobby down to my own children. None of them seemed interested. I soon realized if I wanted someone in this family to start a butterfly collection it would have to be me.

My first victim was a happy little yellow butterfly I now know as the Clouded Sulfur. This is a very common butterfly to these parts, but as I had none at this point I figured I might as well start with the easy ones. Following the how-to section of the very same book my sister had used (now with a rubberband to hold in its pages) I put the poor little guy in a jar with some alcohol, sealed it up tight, and waited for him to die. Then I transferred his lifeless body to the makeshift spreading board I had thrown together and pinned his little wings out flat. I’ll never forget what I found when I went to check on my little friend the following morning. Apparently, I hadn’t quite killed him. I only put him out for awhile. He was still laid out flat on the stretching board, but his little legs were wiggling about, as if screaming in butterfly sign language, “Get me out of here!”

I quickly took him outside and released the tiny paper strips holding him down. As he flew back home to no doubt tell all his butterfly friends of his harrowing experience, I called out, “I’m sorry,” really hoping against hope he’d understand and forgive me for putting him through all that.

Suffice it to say, I do not capture butterflies anymore – except with my camera!

Once I got a decent digital camera with a macro setting for close-ups it became my new hobby. I now have a wonderful butterfly collection; it’s a special photo album filled with pictures I took of these amazing creatures. And I’m happy to report, no butterflies were harmed or traumatized in the making of this collection.

Here's a sampling. Enjoy!

Note: You can click on the pictures to make them bigger.

Red Admiral
7-12-2010
Redwood Falls, MN

Tiger Swallowtail
8-1-2008 (?)
Our Backyard

Painted Lady
9-23-2007
Our Backyard

Mourning Cloak
6-26-2010
Flandrau State Park
New Ulm, MN

Clouded Sulfur
7-23-10
Meeker County, MN

Northern Pearly Eye
7-8-2009
Flandrau State Park
New Ulm, MN

Monarch
8-1-2009
Our backyard
I raised this little feller from a pup!
(I mean a chrysalis.)