Early morning in the

I like to go out in the early morning when the sun comes up to see what goes on in the garden. Join me as we take a look at caterpillars, butterflies, native bees, and birds in our backyard.

[@jennifergreene8891]

Good morning neighbor 😊 Lake Jackson here! I always enjoy seeing your beautiful garden. 😍 With all the birds, butterflies, and bees. Love hearing the doves as well. Early mornings are my favorite time outside. Thank you for sharing your wonderful garden with us. 🙏

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Good morning neighbor! I think it is my favorite time in the garden too. The butterflies aren't out in full force in the early morning, but it is pretty peaceful. The birds do come early to the feeders though - when daylight starts to peak out. Sometimes they are waiting for me to fill the feeders if they are empty. lol. 😊

[@bredear]

Beautiful backyard! This video was so relaxing to watch and hear the birds, even the cicadas, very nice. Thank you!

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

I'm so glad you enjoyed it! 😊

[@HoosierDaddy_]

Those cicadas are noisy little things, lol. I'm so glad you put this video up. Sometimes it's good to just stop working on the garden and just walk in it and enjoy it. Some people work themselves crazy and never stop to enjoy what they're working on!

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Lol ... they are noisy! 😂 I try to enjoy what is in the garden each season because I miss things once they are gone. For instance, we only have Goldfinches in the winter and they are in our backyard January and February. I will have 30-40 come together at the same times each day and they are such social little birds it is fun to watch them. But it is so quiet once they leave in the early spring to go to their nesting grounds. 😊 Right now I have butterflies and our native birds.

[@HoustonKeith72]

My word! So much activity!! So many fluttering wing!

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

I just love lots of activity in the garden. It is so fun to be out in it. The birds, butterflies, hummingbirds, and bees are used to me so they don't fly away. I get to know their little quirks too, which is fun.

[@nicholasryan5401]

Beautiful looking garden, its a pollinators dream. We have not seen many butterflies so far this year in our garden but we do have lots of bees and bumble bees. We don't have hummingbirds in Ireland but we do feed all the small birds in the garden.

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Thank you! 😊 Do you typically have butterflies in your gardens in Ireland? (I think it is fantastic you feed the small birds in your garden. Hopefully they reward you with keeping bugs that are pests under control.)

[@raymondepare5114]

... From Québec ( Canada ) ... your garden is so beautiful ...

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Hello from Texas to Quebec! 😊 Thank you so much!

[@marleneegan-hm7lr]

Everything looks beautiful!

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Awww, thank you! 😊

[@jennetteojeda138]

💖🌸👍🏻🌸💖

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

🥰

[@HoustonKeith72]

Wonderful video!!!

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Thank you! 😊

[@figaro19781025]

Looks and acts like a Hoverfly.

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

You know, when I was trying to find out what it could be one of the first things I looked at were hover flies on the internet because these bees "hover". But the ones in my yard don't look like the pics of hover flies. Maybe it is a special type! Lol.

[@GlendasTexasGarden]

I have those woodpeckers here too, they are pretty. I need to put out some peanuts to bring in more bluejays.

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

If you do put out shelled peanuts, the blue jays, cardinals, titmice, woodpeckers, and wrens really like them. (Squirrels do to, so unless you want the squirrels eating you out of house and home, you can get a feeder that deters squirrels.)

[@cajunlady4893]

Thank you for the beautiful tour. I have woodpeckers in my yard. Found a baby on the ground. It couldn't fly. Waited for parents to help it but they they flew near by. I tried to feed it . But it died. 😢

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

It is a bummer when you see that happen. 😢 You have a kind heart trying to assist it. 🥰 I'm sorry the baby woodpecker didn't make it. I have seen dead baby birds in our neighborhood when I take my puppy for walks. Squirrels are yucky to have because they kill/eat baby birds.

[@cajunlady4893]

@@ButterfliesNBirds I didn't know squirrels kill birds. Maybe the baby fell out the tree hole trying to get food from it's parent. Maybe he was too young to fly back up. Idk My son and I buried it. It was such a beautiful sweet little bird.

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Squirrels kill baby birds, but I don't think they kill adult birds. The baby birds are just more vulnerable. Whenever I see a dead baby bird on the sidewalk, I always wonder what happened to it. I saw maybe two or three this spring that lay dead in people's yards. 😢 I'm glad you and your son buried the one you found.

[@user-kz4vj8wj2f]

Your gardens are beautiful and I love seeing all the butterflies. I have a passion vine with gulf frittilaries. I just notice my plant in infested with spider mites. I can't spray it so I will have to wait until the caterpillars are all done. I also love porterweed. I can't always find it so I started propagating it. Such an easy plant and the bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds love it. Thank you for sharing your piece of paradise with us😊

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Aren't Gulf Fritillaries fun to have in the yard?! 😀 Porterweed is an interesting plant for us in the south along the Gulf Coast. I like it more the longer I have it. When I got my first plant I thought it was interesting, but I didn't like that it only bloomed along a small segment of the bloom spike. 😂 But the more I observed how it performed in the garden and how many things visited it all throughout the day, I started to look into it more. Now I just love having it in the yard. I couldn't believe how bees, butterflies, and hummingbirds went to it all throughout the day. I thought it just had to be empty of nectar. I didn't know the blooms refilled with nectar throughout the day. Ants also don't "steal" the nectar. It is almost a perfect nectar plant. It would be "perfect" if it returned after a winter freeze. 😁

[@user-kz4vj8wj2f]

@@ButterfliesNBirds I have 1 plant that survived our cold spell this past year. Fortunately I took a few cuttings and successfully propagated. Those cuttings are a nice large plant. Hopefully I can do the same this year. Happy gardening and observing all these beautiful things God has created for us to enjoy!!!

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

That is awesome you had a winter freeze survivor! 😀👍 I need to propagate like you did.

[@lonnievarner8021]

u could name “ugly bee” tri-clopse. & i actually like the cicadas.

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

LOL - Tri-clopse is funny - I like it! 😂

[@tammiedunbar6166]

I have not seen many butterflies yet either. I see a lot of different bees&other pollinators though since the early spring. I have various host plants for the catapillers. Usually by mid June my garden has several different species of butterflies feeding on the plants that provide nectar for their nourishment. I noticed s few fire flies last week once it became dark flying around in my yard. I haven't seen them since I was a child in masses Is it because of all of the chemicals that are sprayed on lawns that provide no substance for the pollinators. In my subdivision I have seen only perhaps out of 50 homes maybe five homes providing substance for pollinators. It's really sad & disheartening. Human beings are not the only species upon this planet. With out the pollinators our main food crops couldn't produce our fruits& vegetables and herbs for our nourishment. 😢

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

I think it is wonderful you had fireflies in your yard! 😍 You do describe an unfortunate reality for us in the U.S. ... the plight of pollinators in general. They have a lot of factors going against them. So when people like you particularly plant to assist them, well, it truly makes a difference! 🥰 If we all could do a "little bit" in our "neck of the woods", it would improve their conditions greatly.

[@Pierceb2]

Puzzled by your havering ugly bee “ with three eyes “. It reminded me of a drone Bumble Bee that I get in the fall that hovers over my Buddleia’s scanning for females / Queens but they are really big and didn’t look like yours to me. Could it be a Robber Fly or type of Hover Fly which are bee mimics? As a budding lepidopterist/ entomologist you should get out a field guide for insects and look it up. I Googled it for bees of Texas and hovering bees in Texas but couldn’t find a good match. Behavior did seem to be territorial so I thought a drone. I hope you figure it out as I am fascinated to find out.

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

LOL ... the poor thing ... these bees are actually pretty endearing to us. I admit "ugly bee" is a poor name for it, but I was shocked by its appearance when I zoomed in on a picture I had captured. It has 3 large round spots ... more like in the positions of eyes and nose ... but they they are all the same size. When I was researching at the time for it, I could never find a picture of it ... and we now have quite a few in our yard. It is estimated that Texas is home to between 1100 and 1500 species of native bees, so it doesn't surprise me I had difficulty finding it online. I eventually quit looking. (But I did scour all the Houston area native bee pictures I could find.) It is really difficult to get good pics of it, but if I knew anyone who knew native Texas bees, they could probably help me identify it. 😊

[@baerbelbegnaud5802]

I am just amazed at your garden. I like to garden also, I have a lot of flowers. I need to know more, what kind of host plants to plant. What kind of bird food do you use? I was raising Black Eastern Swallowtails in an enclosure, but this year decided to leave it up to Nature

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

If you have lots of flowers, I know your garden is beautiful! 😍 I used to raise monarch and eastern black Swallowtails in enclosures too, but stopped this year. I had critters break into the enclosures and eat all the chrysalises. 😪 I think they have a better chance of survival in my yard if they can choose their own spot to pupate. For the bird food I use different food at different times of the year. I get all my bird seed at a store called Wild Birds Unlimited. Right now I am putting out Safflower seed for the cardinals and house finches, shelled peanuts for the woodpeckers, blue Jays, and titmice, a blend for wrens, chickadees, shelled sunflower seeds for most birds that visit my yard, and a suet called Bark Butter. Whew - that was probably more than you wanted to know! Lol.

[@baerbelbegnaud5802]

@@ButterfliesNBirds Thank you, that was lots of good information, my husband gets the small sunflower seeds, but the white winged doves have found our yard some year ago and so the blue jays and cardinals, besides squirrels they don’t have much of a chance. We used to have a store of the Wild birds unlimited in Beaumont, but sadly they did not last long. I will contact them again.

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

White winged doves are an absolute menace in my backyard. Flocks of them would fly in (like 40+ at a time) and they would devour all the seed they could eat. They didn't exhibit aggressive behavior, but they are so large that they move out all the other birds. I finally quit using my platform feeders and purchased a "Sky Cafe feeder with dove guard" that has kept them at bay. They are smart birds though, and constantly try to find a way to get to my seed. At least I don't have the flocks fly in now ... but I do have about 5-6 "regulars" that forage and keep trying my other feeders.

[@baerbelbegnaud5802]

@@ButterfliesNBirds I don’t know if I can talk my husband into giving up that beautiful platform feeder from Wild Birds Unlimited, but that would have to happen you are right

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

I hear you! I haven't taken mine down, because I love how it looks in the yard. I just don't put seed in it at the moment. I can tell you I don't have a White winged dove problem anymore. Yay!!! 😀👍

[@cindyenglish3130]

Do you have Zebra Long Wings on your passion vine?

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Unfortunately no. 😢 My Houston area butterfly guide states that Zebra Longwings will fly "occasionally" here. I have yet to see one in my yard.

[@summerofstacey6676]

Hi Crystal, is the passion vine perennial for you? Have you had much hummingbird action this year? I’ve had zero hummingbirds this year 😢 I’m in dfw zone 8

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Hello! Yes, the Incense Passion Vine is a perennial for me. The last three years it has died to the ground due to our unusual freezing events, with temperatures down into the high teens. But, it has come back each spring from the roots. This hybrid is one of the cold hardiest of the passion vines. Some information states it is hardy in zones 6 - 10. We put leaves around it though to protect the roots when we freeze. We had a normal spring with the hummingbirds migrating through. We will only see a few at a time, as they migrate over a longer period during the spring as they move northward. We usually have 1-2 females that stay here during the summer, and they are still with us. But I usually don't see more than a couple during June and July. I wonder why you haven't seen hummingbirds in DFW this year ... I wonder what has been different for them. I know DFW is along the spring migration paths. And hummingbirds migrate during the day. We have had more rain this year than last year. How about you?

[@summerofstacey6676]

@@ButterfliesNBirds yes, we are about 11” of rain ahead for this year

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

@@summerofstacey6676 Oh wow, that is a lot!

[@HoustonKeith72]

Do you have a recommendation for a beginner bird feeder?

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

Oh boy, that is tough. Think about what type of birds you would like in your yard, and that will dictate the type of seed or suet, which will help me recommend a bird feeder. 🐦 😊 (Quality seed is important so you don't have messes in your yard).

[@HoustonKeith72]

@@ButterfliesNBirds my inclination is to say songbirds but that seems naive. What are the best birds for pest control?

[@ButterfliesNBirds]

The birds I have observed to comb through all my pots and garden beds in the summer are the cardinals, Carolina Wrens, mockingbirds, and sometimes blue jays. The feed to attract them are suet (like Bark Butter), shelled peanuts, and shelled sunflower seeds. If you have a squirrel problem, definitely consider a "squirrel proof" feeder or seed/suet laced with hot pepper.

[@HoustonKeith72]

@@ButterfliesNBirds thank you!! Very helpful!!