Here are a few scenes from the 20th Annual Festival of Butterflies, which opened today at Powell Gardens. The fun continues all weekend (and the following weekend, Aug. 12-14). Come on out and have a close encounter with some spectacular butterflies!

 

 

Butterflies pictured above include (top to bottom): Palamedes Swallowtail*, White Peacock, Scarlet Mormon Swallowtail (male)* and Malachite*. *Photo by Alan Branhagen, Director of Horticulture at Powell Gardens

These lucky kids got to help Alan Branhagen release monarchs in the butterfly breezeway.

Each day at 11 a.m. Ms. Frizzle leads a costume parade around the fountain. This year, we welcomed a new parade participant: Linda Williams created an amazing spicebush swallowtail caterpillar (below) especially for the festival’s 20th anniversary!

There’s much more festival fun ahead this weekend. See the schedule at powellgardens.org/butterfly.