As you know I explored the Butterfly place in Westford recently. As a result of that post I was told about another Butterfly house located on Cape Cod. A quick online search turned up an address in Bourne, 26 Herring Pond Rd. I plugged it into my GPS and was off to check it out.
About half way there I realized that I knew where I was going. I’d seen the sign for Butterflies of Cape Cod many times as I headed for the Sagamore Bridge.
I always promised myself I would stop in one day. I didn’t realize it was a butterfly habitat. I thought it was just a gift shop.
Sure enough, my GPS led me right to this spot.
The butterfly house is located behind the gift shop which is in a pretty little house. You enter the front door into the shop and go out the back into a yard. The screened butterfly habitat is right there.
The habitat is smaller than The Butterfly Place in Westford or Magic Wings in Deerfield but that isn’t the only difference. Westford and Deerfield celebrate tropical butterflies. This little habitat features local butterflies and moths. This is nice because you get to see butterflies up close that might only flit quickly away in the open. These are butterflies that could be in anyone’s yard or field.
As you first enter the habitat there are glass enclosures containing caterpillars and chrysalis and pupae. Pass through another screen and you are in the little container garden.
As soon as I entered I spotted a big ole Luna Moth. These are such beautiful creatures. The green shade is “other worldly”. I have seen them before but rarely and it’s always a treat. One of the owners was there and he said it was just sitting there now because it was daytime but that in the evening the Luna Moths get very active floating around on those gorgeous wings.
There were a lot of Monarch butterflies. They seemed to be very social insects gathering in groups on the flowers.
They made great subjects as they paid no attention to the humans wandering around.
Two other butterflies that I’ve often see were also present, one called a Buckeye and another called the Painted Lady.
We had to watch where we stepped because some of those silly butterflies like sunning themselves on the warm, cement path.
There were a couple of local swallow tail butterflies but as is so often in these habitats the tails were damaged or missing.
The challenge was the little white butterfly called a Cabbage Butterfly. They are small and they don’t land long.
Even when they do land they often keep their wings fluttering. I don’t think they are rare. I can remember seeing them everywhere when I was growing up.
I spotted some caterpillars climbing in the greenery, future butterflies on the move.
As I was leaving I stopped in to chat with the proprietors. They can be found on Facebook (who can’t these days) but if you like them you will get updates when a new butterfly hatches in the enclosure.
The little store has lots of nice things from jewelry to books to miniature butterfly enclosures for kids to learn from. Plus they have lots of pictures of their butterflies. I wonder if they would be interested in carrying my cards? I could make a special set of just their butterflies. I think I’ll take a sample next time I go down. Never hurts to ask!