We have talked a lot about honey bees and bumble bees pollinating flowers to produce fruits, vegetables and seeds, but what about Butterflies and Moths? Both Butterflies and Moths belong to the same family (Lepidoptera). There are differences in body shape, and behavior, but the main difference in American Species is the antennae. Moths have feathery antennae and butterflies have long thin antennae that end in a thickened tip. Both are pollinators. For the most part, Butterflies pollinate in daytime and Moths (along with bats) pollinate during the night.
The slide show below features at least four different types of flowers. The yellow and yellow-orange flowers are called Sulfur cosmos. These flowers are from South America and are often mixed in wildflower packets of seeds. Unfortunately, the packages of Zinnias that we purchased were also full of Sulfur cosmos, We did purchase some Zinnias seeds that were actually all Zinnias. Pictures: 1 Mixed Zinnias and Sulfur Cosmos 2. Frost Grapevine that grew wild on our fence 3. Dahlia blooms 4. Moth on a Sulfur cosmos 5. Moth on Sulfur Cosmos 6. Zinnia 7 & 8.Mixed flowers 9. Zinnia leaves 10. Dahlia
