Como Zoo Butterflies

I have finally finished going through all of the pictures that we took on our Yellowstone trip. I will finish up with the Bowdoin stuff and then start posting the Yellowstone pics. There are so many pics that I will likely be posting about Yellowstone through the month of June. In the mean time I am still out taking pics, so I plan to post some more current stuff too, when I have it.

Today a new butterfly exhibit opened at the Como Zoo in St Paul. They plan to have as many as 5000 chrysalises shipped in over the summer. This will allow the zoo to release up to about 300 butterflies per week with 300 to 500 flying around the enclosure at any one time. The zoo has a special permit to house the 100, mostly non-native, species in their 2,500 square foot greenhouse. Even though the weather was not perfect I made a quick stop at the zoo over lunch to take a few pics of some of the more interesting and colorful species.

clipper
lacewing
queen
paper kite
small postman
zebra longwing
owl butterfly
emerald swallowtail

Fortunately the zoo is only a few blocks from where I work so I am going to take the opportunity, over the summer, to photograph and feature some of these exotic Lepidoptera, in the blog, as well as some of the native species that I find in my wanderings. In the end we will all hopefully learn more about these fascinating insects.