She is huge!! Love those Tigers. Don't see many Yellow females.

Whose idea was it to limb up your Tulip tree so high! I've promised myself I won't climb our tree if I see a Tiger depositing eggs out of reach.
This is the first year I've found Tiger eggs on my Tulip tree. I found several right about eye level even though the tree is more than 30 feet tall. I watched one female flying in underneath the lower branches of the tree and depositing eggs on the leaves that hung down there where it's shaded. Our tree is limbed up just high enough so we can mow under it. I was glad to find eggs within reach.
Hope that big female will stick around so you can watch and see where she goes.
I had a male and a female hanging around my garden all day yesterday but they didn't seem interested in each other and I never did see the female around my Tulip tree. They were both nectaring on my verbena b. They're unusual in my yard and I was thrilled to see a male and female at the same time.

Christie, my tulip trees grow in the woods, where the lower limbs drop naturally. I think the lack of limbs there is due to the lack of sunlight on the lower trunk that occurs because the lower trunk is so shaded by other trees. There are a a few branches down low that I'll check out, though.
I normally don't see too many yellow females, either, Sandy, but this year I've seen about as many yellow ones as black ones - go figure!
I just released another black swallowtail, my first female, and she was noticeably bigger than the males. I also released my second pipevine swallowtail, this one a male - one female and one male so far. I'm expecting the giant swallowtails to start emerging soon.
I think I'll go look for cats now - it's cloudy and much less hot!
Sherry

Saw my first Giant Swallowtail in the garden nectaring today. Disappeared before I could catch a pic. I have dozens of Pipevines nectaring. Right now, some naturalized phlox is the nectar plant of choice. There are more than a dozen PVs nectaring on just these plants. They are along the front sidewalk, so everyone comments on them when they come to visit.

I have too many BSTs. I need someone to take some of them to raise. All the Monarchs have pupated, so it's a relief to have a break from raising them. Wish it would cloud over here and drop at least 10 degrees. I think we are going to set a record this summer on triple digit temps. Can't remember starting in June before.

Lawn needs mowing and it is littered with firework leftovers from all the neighbors. Wish they'd come clean up after themselves. I think this is why I'd like to live away from people. Also, then I could let the lawn go!

Sandy

If a ladder can get you to most of a tree, you can do this to find cats: put white sheets under the tree, look to see where the frass is falling and then try to locate who is making the frass based on where the frass is collecting.

The sheets work for all trees but when you do it for big trees and see BIG frass from cats WAY up in the tree, it frustrating to know you cannot get to them. But if you know how to identify frass, you can at least figure out what cats are in your tree.

KC

Sherry,

I had a lovely Tiger ST visit, too. Aren't they lovely? You helped me ID the first one I ever had in my garden in 2009, then I had a visit from one in 2010 and now, again this season. I don't have a host plant for them but I do have the Stick Verbena, which they seem to favor to feed from, that and the butterfly bush. woo hoo, finally seeing a little activity.

Mary

Absolutely beautiful!! Thank you for sharing your picture!

~Laura

Wow, you do grow them big down there!

I get mostly yellow females, rarely the dark form - is that regional?

Mary - You may have Wild Black Cherry in your area which is a host plant for Tigers. It grows in fence rows and along road sides here and is very common so I suspect that it grows in Arkansas too. The flowers hang down in clusters and are creamy white. You can see them but they're not as showy as flowering dogwood. It's already bloomed this year.

Here is a link that might be useful: Wild Black Cherry

Thanks, Christie, for the helpful link. I will watch for that tree. I live in the city but we do have ravines scattered about that still have native plants. I meant I didn't have a host plant in my yard. :-) but I'm so glad to know what their host plant is. I believe I know of one wild cherry about a mile from our location so that could possibly be in the range of the Tiger I just saw in my yard.

Mary

Jean, based on what I've read on this forum since ?2001? I'd say the black form is more common in the Southern part of their range, and the yellow form more common in the Northern part, but that's not etched in stone - I've seen as many yellow gals as black ones this year. The tulip poplars are in the bottom of the hollow, and they're indeed REAL tall. Still, they're not as tall nor do they have the big trunk as the one that went down in the hurricane in 2005 - now that was a big one!

I didn't find any cats yesterday. Maybe the problem is that I brought two water picks with me to put the branch/leaf that the cat might be on. If I hadn't gone ready for cats, I'd probably have found a lot of them and had to go back to the house, get a water pick, then go back and try to find the cat again. :) In addition to the tall tulip poplars, there are many tall wild black cherries that might have cats high up, out of sight and reach.

I did find the red-spotted purple eggs that I saw the Mama lay on the cherry in front of the house, so I should get cats from there soon.

I'm sitting here at my computer where I can look out the window and see some of the cages. A pipevine swallowtail just came out of the chrysalis - YAY!

I'm down to just a few giant swallowtail cats and two black swallowtail cats. I enjoy feeding caterpillars, but I'm still relieved that all those cats are mostly fed - it gets tiring.

Sherry

The vast majority of tigers I see are yellow, only a very few blacks. I'm in Cenral Florida, so it's hard to say which color is more prevalent in what area. The blacks I do see are very large.

Here the overwhelming favorite for laying eggs is the Sweet Bay Magnolia.

Tom, have you found any tiger cats on your sweetbay magnolias? The southern Florida variety of tiger that reportedly uses sweetbay exclusively is also not supposed to have a black female form, just the yellow, so I assume the black ones you see are the regular eastern tigers.

KC, I think my ladder will reach the lower sprigs of leaves on this tulip poplar, but that's about all -
{{gwi:505674}}
Here's another picture of a small group of tulip poplars - they're tall, too -
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I see big frass on the ground underneath these trees frequently, but I don't know what type cats are up there. I've found frass on the ground under shorter sweetgum trees, and I was able to find the cats when I got on my ladder and checked out the leaves - they have always been lunas.
Sherry

The tallest trees in Ohio are tulip trees. Mt. Vernon has some tulip trees that were live when George Washington still lived there. OTOH, I think I can still reach the top of my tulip tree with my 12' ladder.

I just re-read your first post. I missed the smiley face.

Yes, tulip trees are know for their heighth, KC!

A black female tiger has been hanging out in the garden today. I got this picture that shows her undersides - you can see the tiger stripes -

{{gwi:505676}}

Sherry

OH WOW!!! That black tiger is gorgeous, me thinks I'll be spending more time in this forum, if only to see all the beauties shown here.

Annette

Nice pictures, Sherry! I think tigers are really pretty. Last year was a banner year for them here. I've seen some this year but not nearly as many as last year. The butterflies are becoming more plentiful now that it has warmed up. All spring I hardly saw any, but just in the past week I think the population has tripled. One, now three. lol Nah, I probably see about a dozen different kinds a day. The Spicebush Swallowtails have just shown up the past few days, and I see an occasional Tiger Swallowtail. The Cabbage Whites are almost always here. I see several kinds of skippers, but I'm not good at ID'ing them, so I just call them skippers. I have some American Ladies and Pipevine Swallowtails; I don't know if they are ones from other areas of the ones that I've been releasing over the past few weeks. The Great Spangled Fritillaries have been here for maybe two weeks now. The coneflowers and Verbena bonariensis are blooming nicely, and the butterfly bush just started blooming yesterday. I'm just getting around to planting the tropical milkweed in the garden, so it will be awhile yet until they bloom.

There must be a tulip tree in the woods beside us because about every year I have a volunteer come up in one of my flowers beds/gardens. Last fall I noticed that a small tulip poplar was coming up in the pussytoe bed. This spring it was a foot tall and would you believe in just the past couple of months it grew to be 3-4 feet high! I hate to just cut it down, and I'm afraid that in the process of taking it out some of the pussytoes will come out with it. It's probably one of the tallest, if not THE tallest tree that grows in this area.

Even if I don't see a whole lot of butterflies this year, that's okay because I saw plenty last year. I realize by now that they are plentiful one year and maybe not so much the next. I just enjoy what shows up here and all of the pretty flowers. I know you have been having a good year, which is great, and I hope that it continues.

Cathy

'Sounds like you're having a happier year than I thought you would, Cathy! I sure hope your health is holding up well enough!
If you can find a suitable place to transplant the tulip poplar in the pussy toes bed, I'd sure do it! It's fun to watch a tree grow that grows fast! If pussy toes are like cudweed, the ones that aren't affected by digging up the tulip poplar will spread over the area where it was growing very quickly.

This is a fun forum, Annette, so please visit here often and post pictures. Like I said, we don't get many pictures of western butterflies.

I still haven't found any tiger cats - you'd think these females I've been seeing lately would leaves me a gift or two that I can see, like on lower wild cherry branches. I hope they do!

Sherry

Yes, it's going better than it was, Sherry. Being that I couldn't get outside almost the entire months of April and May because of the rain really made it overwhelming for me as far as weeds go. Now that I've decided to turn some of it back into grass, I feel a lot better knowing that I won't have quite so much to keep weeded. I'm trying to "stay on top" of the Canada thistle so it doesn't take over, and I'm hoping that the slow weed killer method works on the passionvine. It's funny that the pipevine hasn't done that. I don't have it planted in any of my gardens like I do the passionvine. The closest it is to any of them is probably about 20 feet. I think this is the 5th year that I've had it here and so far it's behaved well, not trying to take over anything besides its allocated space. I've only seen a few tiny pieces try to grow into the grass over the years, but being that it has a choice of either climbing up the wire or get mowed down, I guess it chooses to climb. :) I have a huge growth of it going up, down and every which way on the wire trellis I put up for it (12 feet high), so I hope it will be happy on there and not get any ideas. lol

If the tulip poplar won't mind being in the woods, I'll transplant it in there sometime (when is the million dollar question). My husband was my digging person last year when I planted my paw paw trees, but now that he had his knee operated on, I doubt if he'll be digging any time soon. If he can't do it, I could attempt it. The digging part itself isn't the problem, but I can't lift the shovelful of dirt to put it to one side when digging the hole to put the tree in. I probably sound like I'm 90 but I just turned 55 on June 1. I sit down to do all of my gardening, but I can't do that in the woods or I'll end up with a bad case of poison ivy and then you'd see me bawling worse than when I have uncontrollable weeds! ;-)

Cathy

@ Jeanne;
We do have black females in our corner and they are just as common as the yellow ones. Look for either a really big black swallowtail or one that looks kind of brown.
Cheers,
Elisabeth