August 11, 2025 • 60 mins
Step into a lush tropical paradise nestled in the heart of southern Ontario as we explore the Cambridge Butterfly Conservatory with naturalist Andalyne Tofflemire. This episode takes you behind the scenes of one of Canada's largest butterfly facilities where thousands of exotic butterflies flutter freely among visitors in a meticulously maintained tropical environment.
Andalyne reveals the fascinating journey of how 1,500-2,000 butterfly pupae arrive weekly from sustainable farms in Costa Rica and the Philippines, supporting both conservation and education. You'll discover the surprising containment protocols that prevent these non-native species from escaping into the Canadian environment, including the vigilant "butterfly hitchhiker" checks that visitors undergo before leaving.
The conversation delves into the intricate differences between butterflies and moths (it's all in the antennae!), the silent crisis facing monarch butterflies due to inappropriate rearing practices, and why fireflies are disappearing from our summer skies. You'll learn that firefly larvae are actually predators that hunt slugs and snails in leaf litter, making them garden allies as well as evening light shows.
For butterfly enthusiasts and gardeners alike, Andalyne offers practical advice on creating butterfly-friendly habitats using native plants that serve as both nectar sources and host plants for caterpillars. She emphasizes the importance of moving beyond mere aesthetics to supporting complete butterfly life cycles in our gardens.
Whether you're planning a visit to escape winter's chill in the conservatory's 27°C tropical greenhouse, seeking to understand more about invertebrate conservation, or simply curious about the insect world that surrounds us, this episode provides a window into the extraordinary complexity of some of our smallest but most magnificent neighbors. Ready to see butterflies, scorpions, giant millipedes and stick insects in a whole new light? This conversation will transform how you view the invertebrate world.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Back in 2016,.
Frank and I had a vision toamass the single largest
database of muskie anglingeducation material anywhere in
the world.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
Our dream was to harness the knowledge of this
amazing community and share itwith passionate anglers just
like you.
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Thus the Ugly Pike podcast was born and quickly
grew to become one of the topfishing podcasts in North
America.
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Step into the world of angling adventures and
embrace the thrill of the catchwith the Ugly Pike Podcast.
Join us on our quest tounderstand what makes us
different as anglers and touncover what it takes to go
after the infamous fish of10,000 casts.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
The Ugly Pike Podcast isn't just about fishing.
It's about creating atight-knit community of
passionate anglers who share thesame love for the sport.
Through laughter, throughcamaraderie and an unwavering
spirit of adventure, thispodcast will bring people
together.
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Subscribe now and never miss a moment of our
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Tight lines everyone.
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Find Ugly Pike now on Spotify, apple Podcasts or
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Speaker 3 (01:12):
As the world gets louder and louder, the lessons
of our natural world becomeharder and harder to hear, but
they are still available tothose who know where to listen.
I'm Jerry Ouellette and I washonoured to serve as Ontario's
Minister of Natural Resources.
However, my journey into thewoods didn't come from politics.
(01:33):
Rather, it came from my time inthe bush and a mushroom.
In 2015, I was introduced tothe birch-hungry fungus known as
chaga, a tree conch withcenturies of medicinal
applications used by Indigenouspeoples all over the globe.
After nearly a decade ofharvest, use, testimonials and
(01:56):
research, my skepticism hasfaded to obsession and I now
spend my life dedicated toimproving the lives of others
through natural means.
But that's not what the show isabout.
My pursuit of this strangemushroom and my passion for the
outdoors has brought me to theplaces and around the people
that are shaped by our naturalworld.
(02:17):
On Outdoor Journal Radio'sUnder the Canopy podcast, I'm
going to take you along with meto see the places, meet the
people.
That will help you find youroutdoor passion and help you
live a life close to nature andunder the canopy.
So join me today for anothergreat episode, and hopefully we
(02:37):
can inspire a few more people tolive their lives under the
canopy.
Under the canopy Well, asalways.
I always want to thank ourlisteners Canada-wide, through
the states all around the world.
You know Switzerland, ghana,trinidad, tobago, the Bahamas
(02:59):
and everywhere else.
And, as usual, you know, ifyou've got a question, let us
know, we'll try and answer it.
And if you you know, if you gota question, let us know, we'll
try and answer it.
And if you have any suggestionsfor shows, we would be more
than happy to see about what wecan do to try and put it
together.
Sometimes it takes a little bitof time, but we're working on
it Now.
Normally in the mornings Iusually get my chocolate lab
(03:20):
Ensign, gunner, out for hismorning run, but lately we have
the great pleasure or well, isit a pleasure?
I don't know.
I don't think Gunner wouldthink it's a pleasure that my
son's dog, Benny, or, as I say,bernard, is with us and he's
ball crazy.
So when he goes out in themorning, you know and our dog
(03:40):
knows the boundaries so I canopen the front door does not go
on the road, it doesn't matterif there's a rabbit or whatever,
but he does not go on the road,but not Benny.
So we got to make sure no carsare coming, because if there's a
rabbit there he's after it.
Just chase it for a bit untilit goes out of sight and then
okay, that's enough.
Where's the ball?
But everything's been okay.
(04:00):
My living apothecary is doingwell.
You know, my sage is growingwell.
My mints, the mullein flowersare out.
So I haven't tried it before,but picking the mullein flowers,
the yellow flowers, and thensoaking them in oil supposedly
makes spectacular eardrops.
Not only that, but after thatthen the mullein leaves, of
(04:25):
course we use for a lot ofmedicinal application, and the
thyme and the rosemary and thelavage.
But I think we do need a bit ofrain, but not like what it is
out west where Garrett is,because he's telling me in
Alberta they're getting drenchedout there and for as many days
as we haven't had rain here,they've had rain just about
every day, which is making alittle bit wet for them.
But that's the way Canada worksand our time will come.
That's the way Canada works andour time will come.
Now, today I've got Anne-DelineTofflemeyer with us from the
(04:50):
Cambridge Butterfly Conservatory.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Welcome, Anne-Deline.
How are you?
I am great.
It's nice to be here with youtoday, yeah great.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Now, just so our listeners know from an
international perspective,whereabouts are you located, say
from Toronto.
Speaker 4 (05:05):
Yeah, we're in southern Ontario, about an hour
and a half drive west of Toronto, so in a pretty well populated
area, and makes for a nice daytrip for most of southern
Ontario.
Oh, very good.
So and tell us a bit about yourbackground.
Sure, well, I'm theconservatory manager and
(05:26):
naturalist, so I do a lot ofthings, but I studied wildlife
biology at the nearby Universityof Guelph, so my background is
a lot of things biological, butinsects were always one of my
favorites, so we're all aboutthe butterflies and the insects
and invertebrates in generalhere at the Butterfly
(05:48):
Conservatory.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
So you studied a lot of insects.
Oh, it deludes me.
Now, what do you call a personwho studies insects?
An entomologist?
Yes, an entomologist?
Yes, I've been trying to get anentomologist on for a while and
occasionally I get somebodyfrom Invasive Species Ontario to
come on and we talk aboutdifferent things.
(06:11):
But maybe we can talk about afew things.
So your background.
So you went to.
Where was it again?
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Yeah, University of Guelph, and Guelph is just you
know, 20 minutes from.
Speaker 5 (06:21):
Cambridge here, Yep, yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
So now tell us what you do at the Butterfly
Conservatory.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
Yeah, so we are all about education and conservation
.
We're a really family-friendlyattraction where you can come
stroll in our tropicalgreenhouse it's one of the
largest butterfly conservatoriesin Canada actually and you
stroll amongst a bunch offree-flying butterflies, birds.
We've got lots of beautifulplants and then on top of that
(06:53):
tropical greenhouse experience,we have two galleries that
showcase a bunch of crittersfrom around the world.
So it's kind of more of like aninsectarium museum feel,
because there's also non-livingspecimens on display.
But we've got other things likescorpions, observation
honeybeehive.
We do have a few vertebrateanimals, so those are the
(07:15):
animals with a backbone.
We have poison dart frogs.
We do have axolotls now, whichare very popular.
We've got stick insects.
We've got lots of things to see.
We always have friendly natureinterpretive staff who are here
to answer questions.
We're here to explain whatpeople are seeing, give you fun
facts.
A lot of our live animals, ourlive bugs are very friendly and
(07:40):
handleable, so we bring them outall throughout the day.
People can meet a giantmillipede up close.
You can hold it, let it walk onyour hand.
Stick bugs are one of our mostfavorite as well, and then you
know we've got a gift store,we've got a cafe, people can
have snacks.
We have an outdoor gardens andplayground, so you know you can
(08:01):
really spend a good few days orsorry ground.
So you know you can reallyspend a good few days or sorry
few hours, half a day here.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Yeah, very good.
So are these indigenous bugs orare they from abroad?
Most of them.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
Yeah, that's a good question.
Most of our animals are notnative to Ontario, so we're
featuring tropical butterfliesI'm sure we'll talk about that
in a minute, where they comefrom and most of our
invertebrates are tropical yeah,non-native as well, but we have
a few and of course, we doalways want to relate it back to
what people can see in theirbackyard.
I mean, for example, for thesummer we're doing guided bug
(08:43):
hunts every day because we havea lovely wildflower meadow out
back and we take familiesoutside and we hand out nets and
bug catchers and we're justlike let's go see what we can
see.
It's like going on an insectsafari.
So we feature a lot of bigtropical things that you don't
always get to meet up close, butwe still want to inspire people
to look for what the neatthings are around us here in
(09:03):
Ontario.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
So, as you mentioned, whereabouts do you get your
butterflies from then?
Speaker 4 (09:20):
Yes, so we import them from sustainable butterfly
farms.
Butterfly farming started up asa really unique but efficient
way of tropical rainforestconservation.
There's butterfly farms allover the world and we import
from two, one in Costa Rica andone that's in the Philippines.
So every week we get a shipmentand I oversee that, so I know
(09:40):
exactly how many butterflieswe're getting in all the time.
We get anywhere from 1,500 to2,000 butterflies in their pupa
stage every week.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
Now, I would know what a pupa stage is, but others
would not, so maybe you couldkind of elaborate on that.
Yes, for sure.
Speaker 4 (09:58):
Because, as you can imagine, it would be hard to
send a bunch of adultbutterflies overseas by plane.
So the best way to transportbutterflies are in their third
life stage.
So they hatch from an egg,they're a caterpillar, the
caterpillar eats and grows andthen it forms a pupa or a
(10:19):
chrysalis and they're in thatstage on average about two weeks
.
They're not having to movearound, they're not having to
eat, so that is a great stagewhere they can carefully package
them up in a box and send it byplane.
You know the shipping processis quite quickly, like we will
get the butterfly pupa withintwo or three days max of it
(10:42):
leaving the tropics there andthen we can open it up.
We have to sort them and thenwe actually very carefully glue
them to sticks so we can suspendthem in a window.
That is a display of its ownreally, because people can come
right up and see all of thesebeautiful different kinds of
(11:04):
butterfly pupa.
You can see butterfliesemerging, drying their wings and
then taking their first flightinto our conservatory.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
Okay.
So now, when these butterfliescome in, is there and I'm not
familiar, to be honest, whetherthere's potential diseases that
can become in from Costa Rica orfor the other location you get
them from, that couldpotentially spread to Ontario
butterflies, or is thatsomething that's taken into
(11:33):
consideration?
To be honest, I have no idea inthis area.
Speaker 4 (11:36):
Yeah, no, that's a fair point and not a lot of
people think about that part ofit.
But the short answer is I is.
I mean, yes, there's thepotential, but I think what the
more or sorry, the moreprevalent concern is is about
the butterflies or the insectsthemselves getting out and
(11:57):
potentially becoming an invasivespecies.
So we are governed by protocolas put out by the CFIA, so
that's the Canadian FoodInspection Agency, and they have
what's called containmentprotocol that we need to follow.
Bringing in all of thesenon-native butterflies and the
other insects that we have.
(12:19):
We have to follow steps to makesure that they're going to stay
within our facility.
They're not going to get out,potentially breed, become a
problem.
So the risk of the butterfliesbringing a disease in that could
get out is lower.
I mean, there's the potentialbut it's more about the animals
themselves becoming a problem.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Yeah, and the exposure to humans to understand
butterflies and insects as awhole is is a benefit to the
society as a whole so they cangain understanding of what to
watch out for and how to lookfor things.
I know because I was theminister of natural resources
when the the emerald ash boarbeetle was basically kind of
identified in ont insouthwestern Ontario and it came
(13:04):
in through contaminated skidswhere they come in from Asia,
and they had the larvae insidethe skids that were used and now
we have that big problem thatwe have.
So it's a big concern andmaking sure that those sort of
things are taken care of.
But what happens, or what sortof things do you take?
(13:24):
Precautions do you take inregards to potential escapes of
butterflies trying to escape orsome of the other insects?
Speaker 4 (13:30):
Yeah, sure.
Well, one of the first thingsis that every exit or entrance,
as it were, to and from thegreenhouse, which is technically
the containment area, has likea double door or vestibule
system, so that I mean, if abutterfly were to actually fly
out the one door, it's not likethey are immediately outside.
(13:53):
So we have kind of like there'sa buffer area.
You know what I mean.
We have butterfly netsstationed at all of those doors
and our staff get very adept atlearning how to use a butterfly
net to catch any that havegotten into those vestibule
areas, because that happensquite a bit.
You know, we've got lots ofpublic coming and going, so
(14:16):
doors being open and closed alot and butterflies fly around
quite haphazardly so we canbring them back in pretty
quickly, quite haphazardly so sowe can bring them back in
pretty quickly.
Occasionally a butterfly mightmake it beyond that vestibule or
sometimes they ride out onpeople.
It is amazing the extent towhich a butterfly can land on
your head or your back and youdon't know it's there.
(14:39):
So we also have mirrors forpeople to check themselves over.
We we have signs that say justcheck for a butterfly hitchhiker
and make sure it stays herebefore you go.
So the butterflies specificallyescaping, it doesn't happen
super often.
And then there's otherprotocols that I don't need to
get into the nitty gritties ofright now.
(14:59):
But yeah, things to keep themthere.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
So it's not something you have to worry about
butterfly smugglers coming inand sneaking them out for the
black butterfly market.
Speaker 4 (15:10):
Well, yeah, I certainly hope not.
And again, there's a lot ofstaff throughout the building at
all points and I think we canprobably keep a good eye on it
that way.
So, yeah, but I hope not.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
Yeah, so how do you feed these butterflies then?
Speaker 4 (15:26):
Great question.
So I mean, because we want anice tropical environment, we
have lots of plants, and we dowant to have as many flowering
plants as possible, because alot of butterflies need to drink
the nectar from the flowers.
And then, on top of that, Imean we want to have as many
different kinds of flowers aspossible, because each kind of
(15:47):
butterfly can maybe only accessa certain kind of butterfly,
like you know, or, sorry,different kind of flower.
A big swallowtail can drinkfrom a long tubular flower, but
a smaller butterfly needs asmaller one Anyway.
So diversity is key.
Keeping flowers in bloom yearround in our Ontario temperate
(16:08):
climate is a bit of a challenge,but a lot of tropical
butterflies, though, also willdrink rotten fruit juice, so we
put out plates of bananas andoranges or sometimes whatever
fruit like.
If we've got some mushystrawberries or something, or
melon, you can put that out, andbutterflies will land on it and
(16:29):
they can drink the juices.
So those are the two main wayswe feed them.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Hmm, and they can drink the juices.
So those are the two main wayswe feed them, Hmm.
So now there's I know inManashwar I'm located, we have.
I go by and there's a signthere that says butterfly garden
and the local naturalist clubmaintains it.
Is there plants that people ontheir own can plant that would
attract butterflies?
Or, as you mentioned, thefruits is there fruit out there
(16:57):
that'll attract butterflies?
Speaker 4 (16:58):
Sure, well, in Ontario fruit isn't the best way
.
I mean, you can kind ofexperiment, and there are some
Ontario butterflies that come toit, but here they have evolved
more to drink from flowers.
So I would start with plants,and yeah, there's a long list of
blooming plants you can put in.
Native is always best wherepossible for a variety of
(17:22):
reasons, but not the least ofwhich it's just what our Ontario
butterflies have adapted to,and you can attract butterflies
in kind of two main ways.
You can plant the floweringblooming plants that will give
them nectar, but you also wantto include some host plants,
which are the plants a femalewill lay an egg on, and then
(17:45):
you're actually sustaining awhole new generation, like
you're, you know, you'reallowing them to go through
their whole life cycle andyou're essentially growing more
butterflies, and that's arguablyeven more important than
putting just some pretty flowersin.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Right, right.
So yeah, and I know well, Ithink most people know about
milkweed and monarch butterflies.
Right, yeah, yeah Now, and,Elaine, maybe you can just kind
of give us a.
So people out there may notknow a lot of the difference
between a moth and a butterfly.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
Can you kind of give us a bit of a breakdown, or
listeners out there.
Speaker 4 (18:24):
Sure, we get that question a lot and moths and
butterflies are extremelyclosely related.
When it comes down to it, Ilike to say they're kind of two
different sides of the same coin.
They are both in the sameinsect order, lepidoptera, which
means they have scales on theirwings and actually there's
almost like 15 times as manymoths as butterflies.
(18:47):
So moths actually are the moreabundant and diverse group, but
they're not all of them.
But a lot of them are nightflying and we tend not to see or
think of them as much.
But if you're looking at abutterfly or a moth, the best
thing to differentiate them isto look at the antenna.
(19:07):
Butterfly antenna are long andthin and they tend to end in a
club at the end, so they'reenlarged at the tip.
But moth antenna tend to lookfeathery or if they're not
obviously feathery, they mightbe upon, like if you have a
magnifying glass, or they theytaper at the end.
They tend not to end in a club.
(19:29):
You'll hear other things.
Like you know, butterflies are.
Butterflies are brightlycolored, moths aren't, but
that's not always true.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Luna moths.
Speaker 4 (19:39):
Yeah, I know right.
And we get another one calledthe rosy maple.
It's bright pink and yellow, soyou can't always go by color.
Some people say, well, theyhold their wings differently.
There's so many exceptions tothat.
I find that that's just noteven helpful.
Sure, some moths can look morefuzzy or hairy, but again
(19:59):
there's some very streamlinedday-flying moths.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
So I always say the best thing is to look at the
antenna.
Great, so now do you have mothsin the conservatory, or just
butterflies?
Speaker 4 (20:15):
Yeah, we have two species of moths that we bring
in.
I would love to have more moths.
There's actually there is a dayflying moth called the sunset
moth that we could potentiallyget in from Madagascar, which I
would love to, but it's hard forme to source.
But we have two kinds of silkmoths.
One is the atlas moth, which isone of the largest ones in the
world, which is pretty cool.
(20:36):
It comes from the Philippines.
It's about the size of a dinnerplate, and we also get a
Rothschild moth from Costa Rica.
I would bring in more moths,but they're just a little harder
to display because those onesare nocturnal, so people don't
see them very much after theyemerge from their cocoon.
You can you get a nice look atthem when they're in that window
(20:57):
where we display them, butafter they take off you don't
really see them again, so theyjust don't display as well now
need to elaborate on something alittle bit more.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
You mentioned about a silk moth, and it's just so our
listeners understand what asilk moth is and how silk is
developed.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
Yeah, great.
So all Lepidoptera larvae, soboth butterfly and moth
caterpillars, they spin silk.
That is how they.
It helps them have grip whenthey're crawling around on
plants and they need the silk tohelp form the pupa in different
ways.
But there's a whole family ofmoths, the Saturniids, called
(21:37):
the silk moths, because they'rethe ones who spin that typical
silken cocoon that we're taughtabout when we're younger and so
when they make a pupa they'retaking it one step further.
I like to tell people it's likethey're wrapping themselves in
a blanket that they've madethemselves of silk and it's a
(21:58):
very tough case.
That protects them and it's alittle confusing because there
is the silk moth that has beendomesticated and we get it silk
to make clothing from, but it'sactually in a different family,
so that can be a littleconfusing.
But I'm referring to a familyof silk moths that make a very
(22:21):
big, tough silken cocoon.
Speaker 3 (22:24):
Right, so, and that's what I was just, I'm glad you
mentioned cocoon, because thecocoon and the pupa is basically
essentially the same thing,right?
Just so people understand.
Speaker 4 (22:35):
Yeah, totally, I mean .
That's why scientists gave theword cocoon to moths that spin
this silken covering, and theyuse the word chrysalis for what
a butterfly caterpillar makes,because the chrysalis is hard
and smooth and it has nocovering.
So whether it's a chrysalis orcocoon, you can refer to both of
them as a pupa or the pupalstage.
Speaker 3 (22:59):
So the gypsy moth it essentially has like a, would it
fall into the silk mothcategory?
Speaker 4 (23:05):
It does not.
It's in a different family, butyou're right in that.
There are other moth larvaethat will use silk to make a
cocoon in a covering, but it'sjust in a slightly different
format.
But you're right, there areothers that wrap themselves in a
cocoon.
Speaker 3 (23:23):
Now I'm just throwing this out there.
I don't know because.
Do you know if anybody's triedto utilize like gypsy moth
cocoons?
Because when a hatch of gypsymoths come in and eat an entire
forest which I've seen andcompletely amazed you go through
and there's not one leaf on anyof the trees anywhere.
So there must be lots of gypsymoth cocoons there, something
(23:44):
like that.
Is that potential, or hasanybody even looked at that sort
of thing?
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (23:48):
Yeah, that's neat to think about.
I'm quite sure somebody hastried and they've.
They've um tried it in the pastbut it doesn't work.
And the reason why there's onlythe one domesticated silk moth
that we can um get silk from tomake clothing is because its
(24:08):
cocoon is one single continuousstrand that you can unravel,
essentially.
But for all of the other moths,like the big atlas moth, I said
, and the gypsy or the spongymoth and all these, their cocoon
is made up of a bunch ofsmaller strands.
So if you try to harvest it,shall we say, or do any
(24:29):
sometimes it just kind of breaksdown or it doesn't.
It's not going to produce thesame quality.
And with the gypsy or thespongy moth specifically,
sometimes it's hairs.
They also spin their hairs intothe cocoon.
They can cause a bit ofirritation.
So it just didn't really workas well.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
For the same thing, right, and how does this differ
from, say, spider webs, or doyou know?
Speaker 4 (24:55):
Well, I know a little bit.
Yeah, I don't know all thehardcore biological facts, but
the butterfly and moth silk is alittle chemically different
than spider silk.
They produce it from differentglands in slightly different
ways.
As to the chemical makeup, thatI don't know.
Spiders, their single strand ofsilk, can be made up of
(25:22):
anywhere from four to eightdifferent kinds of silk or
chemicals coming out.
Moth and butterfly silk, as faras I know, is not as
complicated, not as complex, butthat's kind of where my
understanding ends there, yeahinteresting.
Speaker 3 (25:38):
Yeah, I know these are just, you know, questions
that I'm sure out there peopleare wondering as much as I am.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
I've never heard about this.
Well, and spider's web isdefinitely stronger, like it's
got a lot more yeah, shall wesay, hardcore properties to it,
so spiders have taken it to thenext level or two.
But again, that's kind of thebasis of my understanding.
Speaker 6 (26:09):
Hi everybody.
I'm Angelo Viola and I'm PeteBowman.
Now you might know us as thehosts of Canada's favorite
fishing show, but now we'rehosting a podcast.
That's right.
Every Thursday, angelo and Iwill be right here in your ears
bringing you a brand new episodeof Outdoor Journal Radio.
Hmm, now, what are we going totalk about for two hours every
week?
Well, you know, there's goingto be a lot of fishing.
Speaker 1 (26:30):
I knew exactly where those fish were going to be and
how to catch them, and they wereeasy to catch.
Speaker 6 (26:36):
Yeah, but it's not just a fishing show.
Speaker 7 (26:37):
We're going to be talking to people from all
facets of the outdoors, fromathletes, All the other guys
would go golfing Me, and Garthand Turk and all the Russians
would go fishing To scientists.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
But now that we're reforesting and all things
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Speaker 2 (26:52):
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Speaker 6 (27:02):
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(27:44):
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(29:41):
Hey, thanks for listening.
Back to the episode.
Andalyn, can you kind of giveus a bit of a breakdown on
monarch butterflies?
We briefly covered it, but arethere different strains of
monarchs?
Speaker 4 (29:54):
Yeah, that's a good question.
A lot of people, at least inNorth America, are familiar with
our orange and black monarchthat is famous for its
long-distance migration, butthere are some different species
of closely related butterfliesthat we even get in north
america.
Another is only one truemonarch, which is danaeus
(30:17):
plexicus, which is foundthroughout canada, the us,
mexico and sometimes into a bitof central america, um, but
there's no different strains orsubspecies as of now of that
monarch, um, there's just some,some different species, like
(30:37):
there's the queen, which isfound far farther south, just in
the states, there's the soldier, which is again found in the
very extreme southern us, andthere is, um.
There's even a couple othersthat aren't found in north or
south america, like there's onecalled the African Monarch,
which is native to, as you canimagine, african region, but the
(31:02):
one that we are most familiarwith is the Monarch.
There's no, yeah, differentstrains.
It's a little complicated inthat the ones in Canada and the
US have this long-distancemigration which sets them apart
from the ones that are found abit farther south.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
Well, the reason I bring that up is I know I was
working an event in Lakefield,ontario, which is kind of what
about two hours north-northeastof Toronto, and there was
somebody come up to me that wasthere and it was going into
great detail about how he wasbringing in monarch butterflies
and of a different strain andrearing them and feeding them
(31:45):
different strains of milkweed,because I guess all monarchs
feed on some strain of milkweed.
And I found it a bit concerningthat you know, as we talked
about escapes and things likethat from this particular case,
that these sort of monarchbutterflies that people are
bringing in on their own are notbeing controlled, and can they
interbreed with Canadian monarchbutterflies?
Speaker 4 (32:08):
That is, yeah, definitely concerning and we
need to be really mindful ofthat the mass rearing and
producing of larvae, whetherit's the monarch or any
butterfly to then, be likeshipped around the world or used
for releases or whatnot, is notthe best practice.
(32:30):
And of course people areprobably wondering well, you
just said you order tropicalbutterflies from butterfly farms
, but that's a much differentsetup which we can maybe go into
later.
But yeah, I'm assuming thosemonarchs that person brought in
were likely mass produced insome facility.
Tons of larvae, just get themout, ship them around.
(32:50):
Who knows part of canada thatspreads disease for sure.
And with the monarchspecifically, there's a parasite
called the oe which is beingmoved around, which is not great
and um also spread by theplanting of tropical milkweed,
which sure milk.
That's a host plant for themonarch, but it's tropical, it's
(33:13):
not native to Canada.
So we should really be focusingon the other species of
milkweed that are for here,because tropical milkweed is
also being found to move OEaround and infect monarchs.
So yeah, you got to be careful.
It's best to kind of stay localand stick with what should be
found in your area.
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Right, so you mentioned about butterfly
releases, so are there stillgroups out there that do
releasing of rear and releasebutterflies?
Speaker 4 (33:41):
Yeah, I think there are I don't know of too many
specifically anymore because alot over the years have stopped
doing it Um, but and there aresome that are still sold as
educational kits, you know, foreither teachers or other
educators or or even families,to be able to watch a
(34:01):
caterpillar go through its lifestages.
But again, I, we don't reallyadvocate that because of all of
the um, the, the, yeah, thepotential for moving disease
around, and it's just in thisday and age, with more science
now, and they, they have totallydone studies on it, everything.
It's just we should probably bedoing better practices than
(34:24):
that yeah, I know I did anotherpodcast and I mentioned this.
Speaker 3 (34:28):
There was, uh, happened to be in an event in
Thunder Bay, ontario, and I wasthe chief administrating officer
for the municipality in ThunderBay Invited me over.
He says, oh, jerry, what areyou doing tonight before your
event tomorrow?
I said no, I got nothingplanned.
He said, well, I'm having ablooming tonight.
Would you like to come over?
I said, what are you talkingabout?
(34:49):
And he said, well, I've got anight blooming primrose and it's
going to bloom tonight and ifyou'd like to come over and
watch it, it's kind ofinteresting to see.
And I was like, what are youtalking about?
Anyway?
So sure enough, I go over andthere it is and, just like he
said, you can tell that theflower was going to bloom that
(35:12):
night and it only blooms atnight and all of a sudden it
opens right in front of you andit's kind of neat to see.
But one of the things while Iwas there, he was showing me in
his garden and they had onemilkweed plant and he said, yeah
, the garden club up here istrying to assist the monarch
butterfly by planting milkweedsaround, and you know they were
(35:36):
selling milkweed seeds.
I said, oh yeah, how much.
What do you mean?
They were selling milkweedseeds.
How much did that cost you?
It was $10 a seed.
So I was shocked that $10 forone milkweed seed and anyway.
So they didn't know much aboutit.
But, lo and behold, I made surethat he had an abundance of
(35:57):
milkweed plants, which are fromnorthern Ontario, but so there's
a lot of groups out there thatare trying to assist in making
sure.
But we want to make sure thatsort of thing gets done
correctly.
Speaker 4 (36:07):
Oh, yes, that's true.
Yeah, so that's where I meanand we do now have more native
plant suppliers and greenhousesselling them or the seeds, which
is great, but again it would beit's always best to try and buy
something from local to you.
So if it is Northern Ontario,like, try to get some native
(36:31):
milkweed, shall we say, fromeither a nursery up there or
seeds harvested from reallynearby.
There are several species ofmilkweed.
So, yeah, just kind of like doyour research, make sure what
you're getting.
Some do better in differentregions than others, so, like
you might just even have bettersuccess with one over the other,
but that is certainly the bestthing we can do.
(36:54):
Like, a lot of people sometimeswant to buy caterpillars or
butterflies to release them, tohelp the butterfly or the
species, but that's not what'sgoing to help it long term, for
conservation, we need to beputting the habitat there and
then you'll be sustaining futuregenerations and it doesn't just
(37:16):
benefit those butterflies, itbenefits other insects and
wildlife.
So that's really what peopleneed to do Put in native plants
as many as possible, lots ofhost plants, and let's grow more
butterflies and bugs.
Speaker 3 (37:30):
So you mentioned about potential more details
about the butterfly farms inCosta Rica, and have you ever
been to one and seen how theyoperate?
Like I said, a huge greenhousesort of thing, or how do they do
it?
Speaker 4 (37:41):
Yeah, I've not had the chance to visit one myself.
As it turns out, I will thisyear in November.
I'm really excited to bevisiting our Costa Rica one.
So if you were to ask me a yearfrom now, I'm really excited to
be visiting our Costa Rica one.
So if you were to ask me a yearfrom now, I'll be able to say
yes.
But I know how some work andthey all can do it a bit
differently.
(38:02):
Some it could be a largeenclosed greenhouse where they
have all of the host plants andthey bring in some butterflies
periodically, let them lay eggs,they let them go and again to
be clear, this is all workingwith non-endangered species and
it is sustainable because itdoesn't deplete from wild stock
(38:25):
and it is all self-sustainingand whatnot.
But other butterfly farms itcould even be a bunch of smaller
, a small community, where theyjust have some of the plants
enmeshed with material to kindof keep some larvae there.
When they make the pupa theycollect them.
So they can do it in a varietyof ways.
(38:45):
It just kind of depends on thesetup and the size of the farm.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
And there are a number of these all around the
world.
From what I'm hearing, is thereany of that sort of structure
in Ontario or Canada that you'reaware of?
Speaker 4 (38:59):
No, that's something that in our temperate climate
hasn't really been feasible.
There are some in the southernUS, usually Florida, which often
rear US like Americanbutterflies, but not in Ontario
or Canada and again, because itreally was a model for
rainforest conservation.
(39:20):
That's just where the majorityof them are, but, yeah, anywhere
there are in Africa, there's acouple in Europe.
Apparently there's some inAustralia.
I haven't been able to sourcethem.
Asia, and then Central andSouth America are really hot
spots as well.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
So elaborate a bit more on the facility where
you're working at then.
So somebody coming in and whatare they going to expect and how
does it work there, and kind ofgive us a little bit of a
rundown.
Speaker 4 (39:46):
No problem.
So we buy admission ticketseither at the door or on our
website ahead of time, becausewe do like a lot of places these
days.
We do timed entry to manage,you know, crowd control and
traffic flow and everything, andthen you can enter and exit the
(40:10):
tropical greenhouse area whereall the butterflies are.
You can go in and out as manytimes as you want.
It's just some beautifulpathways and benches where
people can sit down.
You can really take your time.
You have to remember.
It is tropical, so we keep itbetween 26 to 28 degrees Celsius
year round, and in the summerwe've been in a heat wave for
(40:32):
much of July, it feels like.
So that means it's going to bereally hot in there as well.
So we often say like dress inlayers or wear bright colors
because butterflies might comeland on you.
But then again you have theother areas of our building to
explore, like the two galleriesand um and uh.
Average visit for people is anhour and a half or so, just with
(40:55):
all the things you can see anddo, um, and you can stay as long
as you want when you get hereright.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
So do you need to bring water or do you have a?
Those sort of things that youmake available to sell to people
, and stuff like that we have awater fountain?
Speaker 4 (41:08):
certainly that everyone can, because, yeah,
especially being a tropical kindof facility, we want people to
stay hydrated.
And then you can buy drinks orwater in the cafe as well.
But there's a water fountainwhere you can top up.
You can bring water.
Sure, no outside food isallowed, where the butterflies
are just again kind of relatedto containment and because of
(41:29):
all of our the free flyingnature of our animals there.
But you can certainly bringwater with you, yeah, right.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
So in the humidity, what would it be like in there?
Speaker 4 (41:40):
oh yeah, I, I try to keep it around 80 humidity.
Even 90 is great, um, because,again, most of the plants and
the butterflies and the otheranimals, they are tropical,
that's what they need.
So it is a very warm, welcomingenvironment and I think it's
really a neat place to come toin the winter.
(42:01):
We're really happy to be openyear round so you can come in
the middle of January and ifyou're sick of the snow and the
ice outside the middle ofJanuary and if you're sick of
the snow and the ice outside,you can come sit in a 27 degree
environment and have an escapefrom all that.
And I think that's pretty,pretty special.
Speaker 3 (42:21):
Now so do you have other sales and people buy hats
and shirts and all that kind ofstuff.
Speaker 4 (42:26):
Yeah, our gift store has a pretty wide variety of
souvenir type things clothing,games, books, a lot of them
educational as well gifty things.
We do weddings here too.
We do a lot of private events.
We're open for day public usebut we do a lot of things
(42:46):
wedding ceremonies andreceptions, bridal showers,
celebrations of life.
We're really special proposals.
People can book to have aprivate proposal here.
So we have often evening eventsgoing on as well.
Speaker 3 (43:03):
So do you get to deal with other insects as well?
Like this time of year is, Ithink, specifically a lot of
people and I was listening tothem again today cicadas and
things like that as well.
Do you end up with a lot ofquestions like that and your
people can answer stuff?
Speaker 4 (43:17):
Yeah, and I mean you know a lot of our staff.
They're not all entomologists,they're not all people who are
studying insects, but I mean wecertainly provide the basic
information.
All of us are nature nerds tosome extent and if there isn't
one staff who knows the answerto something, there's usually
(43:38):
somebody else like me or someoneelse around who can talk more
about that.
But yeah, we love to talk aboutany bugs we get questions about
cicadas, bees, wasps, birds,like you know, we're happy to
talk about it all, oh yeah.
Speaker 3 (43:54):
You mentioned you had birds inside the facility as
well.
Speaker 4 (43:57):
Yeah, we have a few.
They're mostly small finches.
I've got a couple canaries.
We have two nicobar pigeonswhich you might need to look
that up if you want to see aphoto.
They're beautiful green andblue.
We got them from the TorontoZoo.
We've got some quail on theground, but yeah, they kind of
they add to the environment.
As long as they don't eat thebutterflies, I am okay with them
(44:20):
being there.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
Yeah, well, it's the same.
I recall one of the things thatI did do research when I was
minister was dragonflies inOntario, because I was looking
to try and bring in an officialinsect of for the province of
Ontario, which it didn't have atthat time, and I thought that
the dragonfly would be a greatone for Ontario, and
particularly the, the, thedragon slayer dragonfly.
(44:44):
Have you ever heard?
Speaker 4 (44:44):
of it.
Yes, I have, I would.
I would vote for that one asbeing a great one, because
they're also more abundantfarther north you go, like in
northern Ontario, right.
Speaker 3 (44:54):
Yeah, they will Hudson's, james Bay lowlands,
but I didn't realize that theyactually migrate as well and
will migrate as far as Florida.
Speaker 4 (45:03):
Okay, I maybe didn't know specifically for that
species, but yes, it is truethat there are multiple species
of dragonfly that are migratory,some maybe not as far as others
, and I was just reading anarticle not that long ago that
we're still discovering morespecies of dragonfly are
migratory than we thought.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
Yeah, but the biggest drawback for it moving forward
and the whole discussion kind ofcame to a standstill was
because apparently the dragonslayer dragonfly will actually
eat monarch butterflies.
Yes, so I'm sure you don't haveany dragonflies or darning
needles and things like that inthe conservatory.
Speaker 4 (45:44):
No, and that's why I get that question occasionally.
Yeah, like, why don't you havedamselflies?
Or it would be really cool ifyou had dragonflies flying
around here too.
But then, yes, we have to tellpeople they are insectivores and
they would be preying upon thebutterflies, which is what most
people are coming to see.
So that's too much of aconflict of interest.
Speaker 3 (46:06):
Yeah me.
I would even tempt them a bitand say well, you know, if we
had dragonflies, we'd have toraise mosquitoes in here in
order for them to feed on themosquitoes, and I don't think
people want that.
Oh, I understand.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because Iknow that's one of the biggest
things as soon as thedragonflies come out, the
mosquito population goes downimmensely.
Speaker 4 (46:27):
Yeah, totally.
Dragonflies are even moreefficient at mosquito control
than bats.
Speaker 3 (46:36):
Yes, they are, yeah, and people don't realize that.
So, and there's so manydifferent strains of dragonfly
in Ontario, which was veryinteresting.
So can you tell us?
I'm hearing different thingsabout fireflies.
Do you know much about them?
I hear that they're potentiallyin trouble.
I don't know about theenvironment that they live in,
which may cause them to be introuble, because I used to see
fireflies all the time and Ihave seen a couple of hatches,
(46:59):
one in central Ontario, kind ofbetween Halliburton and Bancroft
, where we have a place up thereand then I have another spot
where we see them.
But I heard something to thateffect that fireflies were in
trouble.
But I don't know if you haveheard anything like that.
Speaker 4 (47:12):
Oh yeah, I can speak to that.
They are in decline, some quiteto the worrisome degree, even
more than scientists thought.
I mean it's a bit of a sadstory.
I mean, you know, like most ofour insect populations are in
decline, which is extremelyconcerning, fireflies being one
(47:32):
of them, and it's a lot.
It's always due to pesticideswe use too many chemicals.
But for also firefliesspecifically, the first part of
their life is as larvae.
They hunt snails and slugs inthe leaf litter and we as humans
tend to want to make things tooclean and tidy and we disrupt
(47:57):
that habitat.
So that also doesn't help.
And then in their adult stage,as flying, glowing insects,
light pollution has also had anegative effect on them.
It disrupts their ability tocommunicate and find mates and
whatnot.
So it's chemical use, habitatloss and light pollution are
(48:18):
kind of the top three things fortheir decline.
Speaker 3 (48:21):
And I didn't realize that you mentioned snails and
slugs that they consume.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
Yes, they are predators.
They're also predatory as adultfireflies, although some adult
fireflies apparently don't feedat all.
But it's just another exampleof insects that depend on other
insects and invertebrates forfood, and we need lots of
invertebrates because they'refood for everything else.
Speaker 3 (48:48):
Yeah, so how do they feed on them?
I don't understand, I don'tknow.
Speaker 4 (48:53):
Sure, to describe a larval firefly, it would sound
pretty crazy.
They're bizarre looking thingslike a shield, they're covered
in shields, they're reallyarmored.
They're just kind of long andthin.
You hardly even see any legs,but they have a very pointy head
.
So from what I understand theyI mean, if it's a slug, that's
(49:16):
not as difficult they can kindof just walk up and they bite it
in the back of the head.
But for a snail they have tokind of like climb up, get past
the shell and, yeah, they kindof go and bite them at the back
of the head to kind of start toparalyze them and then they just
feast on them.
Speaker 3 (49:37):
I had no idea.
Yeah, there you go.
So for people who have concernswith slugs in their gardens,
fireflies is potentially one ofthe answers, if you can find a
way to it.
Now, how would somebody attractfireflies to their garden to
deal with their slug issue?
Speaker 4 (49:50):
Sure.
Well, again, I think the mainthing would be you have to let
it go a little messy.
You need to leave the leaves.
You know, that's something wehear a lot, but it really is
true.
You have to leave some debris,I mean even fallen dead tree or
bark or whatnot the leaves, or,sorry, the plants themselves,
(50:12):
like leaving stems or just snipthem and let them fall down, but
that's a big part.
And then no chemicals.
But attracting fireflies israther tricky because they're
predatory.
So as long as you just kind ofmake the habitat as welcoming as
possible, then you just kind ofhave to hope that adults would
be nearby and they lay theireggs and then they come and find
(50:33):
it.
Speaker 3 (50:35):
Interesting.
Now, if there's somethingthere's, suggestions you have,
because I know there is hugeconcern everywhere and everybody
I talk to about ticks and Lymedisease.
Yes, any suggestions alongthose lines how to deal with
those issues?
Speaker 4 (50:51):
Well, I could offer you some To deal with it in
terms of trying to keep ticksoff your property or dissuade
them.
I don't know how to do that.
That's too difficult, sorry.
Ticks are too easy to be movedaround or by other animals and
they're found in all differentkinds of habitats, so you're not
(51:14):
going to be able to kind ofkeep them from finding your
property.
But you can protect yourself inmany ways.
Um, I mean, I, I go outside allthe time and I've just gotten
in the habit now just alwaystuck your pants in your socks,
um just try to keep them fromsensing the CO2 from your skin.
(51:35):
You can wear DEET, but I alsofind natural essential oils like
lemon eucalyptus are alsoeffective, and you just kind of
have to get used to doing a tickcheck after you come inside and
um be aware and uh yeah,unfortunately they're just
(51:57):
spreading.
They're on the rise.
Speaker 3 (52:00):
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I've tried.
I've made suggestions to a fewabout about the potential
because, as you mentioned, aboutother animals moving them
around, if there was, you know,something we could put in our
bird feed, that the chipmunksand the squirrels and last night
I'm watching the rabbits eatthe sunflower seeds probably on
the ground from the bird feederthat they could eat, to turn
(52:21):
them off them.
It certainly would helpdecrease them being moved around
.
Quite a bit, I would think.
But that's something for otherpeople to think about.
Speaker 4 (52:29):
Well, one thing I can offer up is that possums have
been found to prey upon ticksquite heavily, so they've even
been nicknamed little tickvacuums.
So if we could make morehabitat welcoming for possums,
then they could help keep thosemaybe under control.
Speaker 3 (52:53):
Yeah, I had another person that said that banting
roosters consume ticks immenselyand so there was jurisdictions
in Ontario that were allowingpeople to have banting roosters
in their yard just to reduce thetick population.
But I've never verified that,although this person had a
pretty large organization ofabout I think his database was
(53:13):
about 45,000.
So, hopefully, but I found thatinteresting to hear.
Yeah, wow, Well, and the insectworld is so interesting.
You know, I briefly mentionedcicadas and that time of the
year that we're hearing them,but I happened.
It was right on the driveway Iwas coming in and there was a
wasp on the back of a cicada andthe two were just going at it.
(53:35):
The cicada was trying to getrid of the wasp and I believe
the wasp was trying to lay anegg on it, if I remember
correctly.
Are you familiar with that?
Speaker 4 (53:43):
I am One.
I'm quite jealous that you gotto witness that, because I have
never seen that behavior and Iwould really like to.
What you were seeing was a typeof wasp.
It's called the cicada killerbecause it doesn't lay its egg
on the cicada per se.
It actually was trying toparalyze it and carry it back to
(54:04):
its underground nest where theeggs were laid and the larva
will feed upon the cicada.
But the cicada killer wasp isone of our largest and it's
native and if people see it theyoften get quite alarmed because
of its size.
But I mean, it doesn't hurt us,it's not going after us.
It's just trying to find theadult cicadas to feed its young.
(54:26):
But I have yet to see one hunta cicada.
I'd love to see that.
Speaker 3 (54:32):
Well, it was amazing.
It was spinning around and itwas like a real battle going on
in the driveway and, yeah, itwas something to see.
Yeah, but these are all thingsthat, uh, people, if they just
take the time to enjoy andlisten and see in nature the
things that are out there, theytake a much better chance to
enjoy it.
And and you're you know, yourbutterflyfly Conservatory is one
way to enjoy that.
(54:53):
What else can people see here?
What kind of hours do you havethere?
Speaker 4 (54:56):
Sure, so we're open almost every day.
We just close on Mondays forpart of the year.
So just kind of check thewebsite to be sure.
But otherwise we're usuallyopen 10 to 5.
Sometimes we have extendedhours for holidays and whatnot.
And then last admission is at 4o'clock because, again, you
(55:16):
want at least an hour to enjoythe facility.
So it is highly recommended toget your tickets on our website
in advance to make sure you getyour time, because we have a
limited number of tickets.
And then, yeah, you can arriveanywhere between 10 to 4, stay
as long as you'd like.
If you come on a sunny day, thebutterflies are going to be
more active, right?
(55:39):
So you can keep that in mind.
I mean, they're always going tobe flying around, but I say
they're solar-powered, so thesunnier it is, the more they're
buzzing around everywhere.
And, yeah, our staff would behappy to bring out an animal for
you guys to meet.
You can ask lots of questionsand yeah.
Speaker 3 (55:58):
Yeah, you mentioned the giant centipede as one.
Yeah, so and Lynn, how do yousupport the facility?
I mean, it must cost a fair bitto bring in all these insects
and then keep the temperatureand like in cold weather and
things like that.
How do you financially keepthings in check there at the
facility?
Speaker 4 (56:17):
Yeah, we get minimal to no funding.
So it's just, yeah, we're kindof self-sustaining.
It's all based on our ticketsales and the events we do and
purchases from our gift storeand cafe and whatnot.
So you know, we really aregrateful for the support of
people who keep coming out.
(56:38):
We have memberships available.
If someone comes and they loveit so much, then you can get a
year long membership so you cancome as many times as you'd like
.
And but we, yeah, we're, we'rejust a independently owned local
organization.
And but, yeah, but we, yeah,we're just an independently
owned local organization.
And but yeah, you know,bringing in tropical butterflies
and the heating costs, they all, that's quite a bit.
Speaker 3 (57:01):
So do you have a newsletter or things like that
as well?
Speaker 4 (57:03):
We don't have a super regular newsletter right now.
We're really active on socialmedia, so if you do visit our
website, which iscambridgebutterflycom, you would
be invited to sign up foremails if you want.
But you're also probably bestto go to our Facebook or our
Instagram, because we're alwaysposting videos and photos,
(57:25):
because so much of what we doit's very visually appealing.
So we try to post lots of funpictures and videos so you get
snippets of what goes on hereand what you can see.
That would be kind of the bestway to keep in touch.
Speaker 3 (57:41):
Very good.
So, anne-lynne.
So how can people find out moreinformation or details about
the Cambridge ButterflyConservatory?
Speaker 4 (57:50):
So go to our website for a lot of information.
You know like frequently askedquestions what should I bring?
And to get your tickets?
So that'swwwcambridgebutterflycom, but
you could also give us a call ifyou want to talk through
anything.
Our number's on there too.
People can email me.
I'm the naturalist here, so I'mkind of the go-to if it comes
(58:13):
down to an ID question.
Like I saw a bug in my yard.
I don't know what it is.
I love getting pictures frompeople if they want to send a
photo or anything like that, butI think our website definitely
has a lot of the key info to getyou started.
Speaker 3 (58:28):
Very good.
Well, thanks very much.
We really appreciate all theinformation and I found it very
interesting and enlightening andlearning quite a bit about
butterflies in your facility andI think that this is just
something a little bit differentthat people are learning out
there under the canopy.
Thanks very much, Angela.
Speaker 4 (58:45):
Yeah, thank you.
It was so much fun to be ableto talk bugs with you.
Speaker 7 (59:10):
How did a small town sheet metal mechanic come to
build one of Canada's mosticonic fishing lodges?
I'm your host, steve Nitzwicky,and you'll find out about that
and a whole lot more on theOutdoor Journal Radio Network's
newest podcast, diaries of aLodge Owner.
But this podcast will be morethan that.
Every week on Diaries of aLodge Owner, I'm going to
(59:33):
introduce you to a ton of greatpeople, share their stories of
our trials, tribulations andinspirations, learn and have
plenty of laughs along the way.
Speaker 6 (59:44):
Meanwhile we're sitting there bobbing along
trying to figure out how tocatch a bass and we both decided
one day we were going to be ontelevision doing a fishing show.
Speaker 7 (59:54):
My hands get sore a little bit when I'm reeling in
all those bass in the summertime, but that might be for more
fishing than it was.
Punching you so confidently,you said hey, pat, have you ever
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Find Diaries of a Lodge Ownernow on Spotify, apple Podcasts
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Back in 2016,.
Frank and I had a vision toamass the single largest
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Speaker 2 (00:09):
Our dream was to harness the knowledge of this
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Tight lines everyone.
Speaker 1 (00:56):
Find Ugly Pike now on Spotify, apple Podcasts or
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Speaker 3 (01:12):
As the world gets louder and louder, the lessons
of our natural world becomeharder and harder to hear, but
they are still available tothose who know where to listen.
I'm Jerry Ouellette and I washonoured to serve as Ontario's
Minister of Natural Resources.
However, my journey into thewoods didn't come from politics.
(01:33):
Rather, it came from my time inthe bush and a mushroom.
In 2015, I was introduced tothe birch-hungry fungus known as
chaga, a tree conch withcenturies of medicinal
applications used by Indigenouspeoples all over the globe.
After nearly a decade ofharvest, use, testimonials and
(01:56):
research, my skepticism hasfaded to obsession and I now
spend my life dedicated toimproving the lives of others
through natural means.
But that's not what the show isabout.
My pursuit of this strangemushroom and my passion for the
outdoors has brought me to theplaces and around the people
that are shaped by our naturalworld.
(02:17):
On Outdoor Journal Radio'sUnder the Canopy podcast, I'm
going to take you along with meto see the places, meet the
people.
That will help you find youroutdoor passion and help you
live a life close to nature andunder the canopy.
So join me today for anothergreat episode, and hopefully we
(02:37):
can inspire a few more people tolive their lives under the
canopy.
Under the canopy Well, asalways.
I always want to thank ourlisteners Canada-wide, through
the states all around the world.
You know Switzerland, ghana,trinidad, tobago, the Bahamas
(02:59):
and everywhere else.
And, as usual, you know, ifyou've got a question, let us
know, we'll try and answer it.
And if you you know, if you gota question, let us know, we'll
try and answer it.
And if you have any suggestionsfor shows, we would be more
than happy to see about what wecan do to try and put it
together.
Sometimes it takes a little bitof time, but we're working on
it Now.
Normally in the mornings Iusually get my chocolate lab
(03:20):
Ensign, gunner, out for hismorning run, but lately we have
the great pleasure or well, isit a pleasure?
I don't know.
I don't think Gunner wouldthink it's a pleasure that my
son's dog, Benny, or, as I say,bernard, is with us and he's
ball crazy.
So when he goes out in themorning, you know and our dog
(03:40):
knows the boundaries so I canopen the front door does not go
on the road, it doesn't matterif there's a rabbit or whatever,
but he does not go on the road,but not Benny.
So we got to make sure no carsare coming, because if there's a
rabbit there he's after it.
Just chase it for a bit untilit goes out of sight and then
okay, that's enough.
Where's the ball?
But everything's been okay.
(04:00):
My living apothecary is doingwell.
You know, my sage is growingwell.
My mints, the mullein flowersare out.
So I haven't tried it before,but picking the mullein flowers,
the yellow flowers, and thensoaking them in oil supposedly
makes spectacular eardrops.
Not only that, but after thatthen the mullein leaves, of
(04:25):
course we use for a lot ofmedicinal application, and the
thyme and the rosemary and thelavage.
But I think we do need a bit ofrain, but not like what it is
out west where Garrett is,because he's telling me in
Alberta they're getting drenchedout there and for as many days
as we haven't had rain here,they've had rain just about
every day, which is making alittle bit wet for them.
But that's the way Canada worksand our time will come.
That's the way Canada works andour time will come.
Now, today I've got Anne-DelineTofflemeyer with us from the
(04:50):
Cambridge Butterfly Conservatory.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Welcome, Anne-Deline.
How are you?
I am great.
It's nice to be here with youtoday, yeah great.
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Now, just so our listeners know from an
international perspective,whereabouts are you located, say
from Toronto.
Speaker 4 (05:05):
Yeah, we're in southern Ontario, about an hour
and a half drive west of Toronto, so in a pretty well populated
area, and makes for a nice daytrip for most of southern
Ontario.
Oh, very good.
So and tell us a bit about yourbackground.
Sure, well, I'm theconservatory manager and
(05:26):
naturalist, so I do a lot ofthings, but I studied wildlife
biology at the nearby Universityof Guelph, so my background is
a lot of things biological, butinsects were always one of my
favorites, so we're all aboutthe butterflies and the insects
and invertebrates in generalhere at the Butterfly
(05:48):
Conservatory.
Speaker 3 (05:50):
So you studied a lot of insects.
Oh, it deludes me.
Now, what do you call a personwho studies insects?
An entomologist?
Yes, an entomologist?
Yes, I've been trying to get anentomologist on for a while and
occasionally I get somebodyfrom Invasive Species Ontario to
come on and we talk aboutdifferent things.
(06:11):
But maybe we can talk about afew things.
So your background.
So you went to.
Where was it again?
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Yeah, University of Guelph, and Guelph is just you
know, 20 minutes from.
Speaker 5 (06:21):
Cambridge here, Yep, yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
So now tell us what you do at the Butterfly
Conservatory.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
Yeah, so we are all about education and conservation
.
We're a really family-friendlyattraction where you can come
stroll in our tropicalgreenhouse it's one of the
largest butterfly conservatoriesin Canada actually and you
stroll amongst a bunch offree-flying butterflies, birds.
We've got lots of beautifulplants and then on top of that
(06:53):
tropical greenhouse experience,we have two galleries that
showcase a bunch of crittersfrom around the world.
So it's kind of more of like aninsectarium museum feel,
because there's also non-livingspecimens on display.
But we've got other things likescorpions, observation
honeybeehive.
We do have a few vertebrateanimals, so those are the
(07:15):
animals with a backbone.
We have poison dart frogs.
We do have axolotls now, whichare very popular.
We've got stick insects.
We've got lots of things to see.
We always have friendly natureinterpretive staff who are here
to answer questions.
We're here to explain whatpeople are seeing, give you fun
facts.
A lot of our live animals, ourlive bugs are very friendly and
(07:40):
handleable, so we bring them outall throughout the day.
People can meet a giantmillipede up close.
You can hold it, let it walk onyour hand.
Stick bugs are one of our mostfavorite as well, and then you
know we've got a gift store,we've got a cafe, people can
have snacks.
We have an outdoor gardens andplayground, so you know you can
(08:01):
really spend a good few days orsorry ground.
So you know you can reallyspend a good few days or sorry
few hours, half a day here.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Yeah, very good.
So are these indigenous bugs orare they from abroad?
Most of them.
Speaker 4 (08:19):
Yeah, that's a good question.
Most of our animals are notnative to Ontario, so we're
featuring tropical butterfliesI'm sure we'll talk about that
in a minute, where they comefrom and most of our
invertebrates are tropical yeah,non-native as well, but we have
a few and of course, we doalways want to relate it back to
what people can see in theirbackyard.
I mean, for example, for thesummer we're doing guided bug
(08:43):
hunts every day because we havea lovely wildflower meadow out
back and we take familiesoutside and we hand out nets and
bug catchers and we're justlike let's go see what we can
see.
It's like going on an insectsafari.
So we feature a lot of bigtropical things that you don't
always get to meet up close, butwe still want to inspire people
to look for what the neatthings are around us here in
(09:03):
Ontario.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
So, as you mentioned, whereabouts do you get your
butterflies from then?
Speaker 4 (09:20):
Yes, so we import them from sustainable butterfly
farms.
Butterfly farming started up asa really unique but efficient
way of tropical rainforestconservation.
There's butterfly farms allover the world and we import
from two, one in Costa Rica andone that's in the Philippines.
So every week we get a shipmentand I oversee that, so I know
(09:40):
exactly how many butterflieswe're getting in all the time.
We get anywhere from 1,500 to2,000 butterflies in their pupa
stage every week.
Speaker 3 (09:53):
Now, I would know what a pupa stage is, but others
would not, so maybe you couldkind of elaborate on that.
Yes, for sure.
Speaker 4 (09:58):
Because, as you can imagine, it would be hard to
send a bunch of adultbutterflies overseas by plane.
So the best way to transportbutterflies are in their third
life stage.
So they hatch from an egg,they're a caterpillar, the
caterpillar eats and grows andthen it forms a pupa or a
(10:19):
chrysalis and they're in thatstage on average about two weeks
.
They're not having to movearound, they're not having to
eat, so that is a great stagewhere they can carefully package
them up in a box and send it byplane.
You know the shipping processis quite quickly, like we will
get the butterfly pupa withintwo or three days max of it
(10:42):
leaving the tropics there andthen we can open it up.
We have to sort them and thenwe actually very carefully glue
them to sticks so we can suspendthem in a window.
That is a display of its ownreally, because people can come
right up and see all of thesebeautiful different kinds of
(11:04):
butterfly pupa.
You can see butterfliesemerging, drying their wings and
then taking their first flightinto our conservatory.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
Okay.
So now, when these butterfliescome in, is there and I'm not
familiar, to be honest, whetherthere's potential diseases that
can become in from Costa Rica orfor the other location you get
them from, that couldpotentially spread to Ontario
butterflies, or is thatsomething that's taken into
(11:33):
consideration?
To be honest, I have no idea inthis area.
Speaker 4 (11:36):
Yeah, no, that's a fair point and not a lot of
people think about that part ofit.
But the short answer is I is.
I mean, yes, there's thepotential, but I think what the
more or sorry, the moreprevalent concern is is about
the butterflies or the insectsthemselves getting out and
(11:57):
potentially becoming an invasivespecies.
So we are governed by protocolas put out by the CFIA, so
that's the Canadian FoodInspection Agency, and they have
what's called containmentprotocol that we need to follow.
Bringing in all of thesenon-native butterflies and the
other insects that we have.
(12:19):
We have to follow steps to makesure that they're going to stay
within our facility.
They're not going to get out,potentially breed, become a
problem.
So the risk of the butterfliesbringing a disease in that could
get out is lower.
I mean, there's the potentialbut it's more about the animals
themselves becoming a problem.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Yeah, and the exposure to humans to understand
butterflies and insects as awhole is is a benefit to the
society as a whole so they cangain understanding of what to
watch out for and how to lookfor things.
I know because I was theminister of natural resources
when the the emerald ash boarbeetle was basically kind of
identified in ont insouthwestern Ontario and it came
(13:04):
in through contaminated skidswhere they come in from Asia,
and they had the larvae insidethe skids that were used and now
we have that big problem thatwe have.
So it's a big concern andmaking sure that those sort of
things are taken care of.
But what happens, or what sortof things do you take?
(13:24):
Precautions do you take inregards to potential escapes of
butterflies trying to escape orsome of the other insects?
Speaker 4 (13:30):
Yeah, sure.
Well, one of the first thingsis that every exit or entrance,
as it were, to and from thegreenhouse, which is technically
the containment area, has likea double door or vestibule
system, so that I mean, if abutterfly were to actually fly
out the one door, it's not likethey are immediately outside.
(13:53):
So we have kind of like there'sa buffer area.
You know what I mean.
We have butterfly netsstationed at all of those doors
and our staff get very adept atlearning how to use a butterfly
net to catch any that havegotten into those vestibule
areas, because that happensquite a bit.
You know, we've got lots ofpublic coming and going, so
(14:16):
doors being open and closed alot and butterflies fly around
quite haphazardly so we canbring them back in pretty
quickly, quite haphazardly so sowe can bring them back in
pretty quickly.
Occasionally a butterfly mightmake it beyond that vestibule or
sometimes they ride out onpeople.
It is amazing the extent towhich a butterfly can land on
your head or your back and youdon't know it's there.
(14:39):
So we also have mirrors forpeople to check themselves over.
We we have signs that say justcheck for a butterfly hitchhiker
and make sure it stays herebefore you go.
So the butterflies specificallyescaping, it doesn't happen
super often.
And then there's otherprotocols that I don't need to
get into the nitty gritties ofright now.
(14:59):
But yeah, things to keep themthere.
Speaker 3 (15:02):
So it's not something you have to worry about
butterfly smugglers coming inand sneaking them out for the
black butterfly market.
Speaker 4 (15:10):
Well, yeah, I certainly hope not.
And again, there's a lot ofstaff throughout the building at
all points and I think we canprobably keep a good eye on it
that way.
So, yeah, but I hope not.
Speaker 3 (15:23):
Yeah, so how do you feed these butterflies then?
Speaker 4 (15:26):
Great question.
So I mean, because we want anice tropical environment, we
have lots of plants, and we dowant to have as many flowering
plants as possible, because alot of butterflies need to drink
the nectar from the flowers.
And then, on top of that, Imean we want to have as many
different kinds of flowers aspossible, because each kind of
(15:47):
butterfly can maybe only accessa certain kind of butterfly,
like you know, or, sorry,different kind of flower.
A big swallowtail can drinkfrom a long tubular flower, but
a smaller butterfly needs asmaller one Anyway.
So diversity is key.
Keeping flowers in bloom yearround in our Ontario temperate
(16:08):
climate is a bit of a challenge,but a lot of tropical
butterflies, though, also willdrink rotten fruit juice, so we
put out plates of bananas andoranges or sometimes whatever
fruit like.
If we've got some mushystrawberries or something, or
melon, you can put that out, andbutterflies will land on it and
(16:29):
they can drink the juices.
So those are the two main wayswe feed them.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Hmm, and they can drink the juices.
So those are the two main wayswe feed them, Hmm.
So now there's I know inManashwar I'm located, we have.
I go by and there's a signthere that says butterfly garden
and the local naturalist clubmaintains it.
Is there plants that people ontheir own can plant that would
attract butterflies?
Or, as you mentioned, thefruits is there fruit out there
(16:57):
that'll attract butterflies?
Speaker 4 (16:58):
Sure, well, in Ontario fruit isn't the best way
.
I mean, you can kind ofexperiment, and there are some
Ontario butterflies that come toit, but here they have evolved
more to drink from flowers.
So I would start with plants,and yeah, there's a long list of
blooming plants you can put in.
Native is always best wherepossible for a variety of
(17:22):
reasons, but not the least ofwhich it's just what our Ontario
butterflies have adapted to,and you can attract butterflies
in kind of two main ways.
You can plant the floweringblooming plants that will give
them nectar, but you also wantto include some host plants,
which are the plants a femalewill lay an egg on, and then
(17:45):
you're actually sustaining awhole new generation, like
you're, you know, you'reallowing them to go through
their whole life cycle andyou're essentially growing more
butterflies, and that's arguablyeven more important than
putting just some pretty flowersin.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Right, right.
So yeah, and I know well, Ithink most people know about
milkweed and monarch butterflies.
Right, yeah, yeah Now, and,Elaine, maybe you can just kind
of give us a.
So people out there may notknow a lot of the difference
between a moth and a butterfly.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
Can you kind of give us a bit of a breakdown, or
listeners out there.
Speaker 4 (18:24):
Sure, we get that question a lot and moths and
butterflies are extremelyclosely related.
When it comes down to it, Ilike to say they're kind of two
different sides of the same coin.
They are both in the sameinsect order, lepidoptera, which
means they have scales on theirwings and actually there's
almost like 15 times as manymoths as butterflies.
(18:47):
So moths actually are the moreabundant and diverse group, but
they're not all of them.
But a lot of them are nightflying and we tend not to see or
think of them as much.
But if you're looking at abutterfly or a moth, the best
thing to differentiate them isto look at the antenna.
(19:07):
Butterfly antenna are long andthin and they tend to end in a
club at the end, so they'reenlarged at the tip.
But moth antenna tend to lookfeathery or if they're not
obviously feathery, they mightbe upon, like if you have a
magnifying glass, or they theytaper at the end.
They tend not to end in a club.
(19:29):
You'll hear other things.
Like you know, butterflies are.
Butterflies are brightlycolored, moths aren't, but
that's not always true.
Speaker 3 (19:38):
Luna moths.
Speaker 4 (19:39):
Yeah, I know right.
And we get another one calledthe rosy maple.
It's bright pink and yellow, soyou can't always go by color.
Some people say, well, theyhold their wings differently.
There's so many exceptions tothat.
I find that that's just noteven helpful.
Sure, some moths can look morefuzzy or hairy, but again
(19:59):
there's some very streamlinedday-flying moths.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
So I always say the best thing is to look at the
antenna.
Great, so now do you have mothsin the conservatory, or just
butterflies?
Speaker 4 (20:15):
Yeah, we have two species of moths that we bring
in.
I would love to have more moths.
There's actually there is a dayflying moth called the sunset
moth that we could potentiallyget in from Madagascar, which I
would love to, but it's hard forme to source.
But we have two kinds of silkmoths.
One is the atlas moth, which isone of the largest ones in the
world, which is pretty cool.
(20:36):
It comes from the Philippines.
It's about the size of a dinnerplate, and we also get a
Rothschild moth from Costa Rica.
I would bring in more moths,but they're just a little harder
to display because those onesare nocturnal, so people don't
see them very much after theyemerge from their cocoon.
You can you get a nice look atthem when they're in that window
(20:57):
where we display them, butafter they take off you don't
really see them again, so theyjust don't display as well now
need to elaborate on something alittle bit more.
Speaker 3 (21:07):
You mentioned about a silk moth, and it's just so our
listeners understand what asilk moth is and how silk is
developed.
Speaker 4 (21:13):
Yeah, great.
So all Lepidoptera larvae, soboth butterfly and moth
caterpillars, they spin silk.
That is how they.
It helps them have grip whenthey're crawling around on
plants and they need the silk tohelp form the pupa in different
ways.
But there's a whole family ofmoths, the Saturniids, called
(21:37):
the silk moths, because they'rethe ones who spin that typical
silken cocoon that we're taughtabout when we're younger and so
when they make a pupa they'retaking it one step further.
I like to tell people it's likethey're wrapping themselves in
a blanket that they've madethemselves of silk and it's a
(21:58):
very tough case.
That protects them and it's alittle confusing because there
is the silk moth that has beendomesticated and we get it silk
to make clothing from, but it'sactually in a different family,
so that can be a littleconfusing.
But I'm referring to a familyof silk moths that make a very
(22:21):
big, tough silken cocoon.
Speaker 3 (22:24):
Right, so, and that's what I was just, I'm glad you
mentioned cocoon, because thecocoon and the pupa is basically
essentially the same thing,right?
Just so people understand.
Speaker 4 (22:35):
Yeah, totally, I mean .
That's why scientists gave theword cocoon to moths that spin
this silken covering, and theyuse the word chrysalis for what
a butterfly caterpillar makes,because the chrysalis is hard
and smooth and it has nocovering.
So whether it's a chrysalis orcocoon, you can refer to both of
them as a pupa or the pupalstage.
Speaker 3 (22:59):
So the gypsy moth it essentially has like a, would it
fall into the silk mothcategory?
Speaker 4 (23:05):
It does not.
It's in a different family, butyou're right in that.
There are other moth larvaethat will use silk to make a
cocoon in a covering, but it'sjust in a slightly different
format.
But you're right, there areothers that wrap themselves in a
cocoon.
Speaker 3 (23:23):
Now I'm just throwing this out there.
I don't know because.
Do you know if anybody's triedto utilize like gypsy moth
cocoons?
Because when a hatch of gypsymoths come in and eat an entire
forest which I've seen andcompletely amazed you go through
and there's not one leaf on anyof the trees anywhere.
So there must be lots of gypsymoth cocoons there, something
(23:44):
like that.
Is that potential, or hasanybody even looked at that sort
of thing?
I don't know.
Speaker 4 (23:48):
Yeah, that's neat to think about.
I'm quite sure somebody hastried and they've.
They've um tried it in the pastbut it doesn't work.
And the reason why there's onlythe one domesticated silk moth
that we can um get silk from tomake clothing is because its
(24:08):
cocoon is one single continuousstrand that you can unravel,
essentially.
But for all of the other moths,like the big atlas moth, I said
, and the gypsy or the spongymoth and all these, their cocoon
is made up of a bunch ofsmaller strands.
So if you try to harvest it,shall we say, or do any
(24:29):
sometimes it just kind of breaksdown or it doesn't.
It's not going to produce thesame quality.
And with the gypsy or thespongy moth specifically,
sometimes it's hairs.
They also spin their hairs intothe cocoon.
They can cause a bit ofirritation.
So it just didn't really workas well.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
For the same thing, right, and how does this differ
from, say, spider webs, or doyou know?
Speaker 4 (24:55):
Well, I know a little bit.
Yeah, I don't know all thehardcore biological facts, but
the butterfly and moth silk is alittle chemically different
than spider silk.
They produce it from differentglands in slightly different
ways.
As to the chemical makeup, thatI don't know.
Spiders, their single strand ofsilk, can be made up of
(25:22):
anywhere from four to eightdifferent kinds of silk or
chemicals coming out.
Moth and butterfly silk, as faras I know, is not as
complicated, not as complex, butthat's kind of where my
understanding ends there, yeahinteresting.
Speaker 3 (25:38):
Yeah, I know these are just, you know, questions
that I'm sure out there peopleare wondering as much as I am.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
I've never heard about this.
Well, and spider's web isdefinitely stronger, like it's
got a lot more yeah, shall wesay, hardcore properties to it,
so spiders have taken it to thenext level or two.
But again, that's kind of thebasis of my understanding.
Speaker 6 (26:09):
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(27:44):
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(29:41):
Hey, thanks for listening.
Back to the episode.
Andalyn, can you kind of giveus a bit of a breakdown on
monarch butterflies?
We briefly covered it, but arethere different strains of
monarchs?
Speaker 4 (29:54):
Yeah, that's a good question.
A lot of people, at least inNorth America, are familiar with
our orange and black monarchthat is famous for its
long-distance migration, butthere are some different species
of closely related butterfliesthat we even get in north
america.
Another is only one truemonarch, which is danaeus
(30:17):
plexicus, which is foundthroughout canada, the us,
mexico and sometimes into a bitof central america, um, but
there's no different strains orsubspecies as of now of that
monarch, um, there's just some,some different species, like
(30:37):
there's the queen, which isfound far farther south, just in
the states, there's the soldier, which is again found in the
very extreme southern us, andthere is, um.
There's even a couple othersthat aren't found in north or
south america, like there's onecalled the African Monarch,
which is native to, as you canimagine, african region, but the
(31:02):
one that we are most familiarwith is the Monarch.
There's no, yeah, differentstrains.
It's a little complicated inthat the ones in Canada and the
US have this long-distancemigration which sets them apart
from the ones that are found abit farther south.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
Well, the reason I bring that up is I know I was
working an event in Lakefield,ontario, which is kind of what
about two hours north-northeastof Toronto, and there was
somebody come up to me that wasthere and it was going into
great detail about how he wasbringing in monarch butterflies
and of a different strain andrearing them and feeding them
(31:45):
different strains of milkweed,because I guess all monarchs
feed on some strain of milkweed.
And I found it a bit concerningthat you know, as we talked
about escapes and things likethat from this particular case,
that these sort of monarchbutterflies that people are
bringing in on their own are notbeing controlled, and can they
interbreed with Canadian monarchbutterflies?
Speaker 4 (32:08):
That is, yeah, definitely concerning and we
need to be really mindful ofthat the mass rearing and
producing of larvae, whetherit's the monarch or any
butterfly to then, be likeshipped around the world or used
for releases or whatnot, is notthe best practice.
(32:30):
And of course people areprobably wondering well, you
just said you order tropicalbutterflies from butterfly farms
, but that's a much differentsetup which we can maybe go into
later.
But yeah, I'm assuming thosemonarchs that person brought in
were likely mass produced insome facility.
Tons of larvae, just get themout, ship them around.
(32:50):
Who knows part of canada thatspreads disease for sure.
And with the monarchspecifically, there's a parasite
called the oe which is beingmoved around, which is not great
and um also spread by theplanting of tropical milkweed,
which sure milk.
That's a host plant for themonarch, but it's tropical, it's
(33:13):
not native to Canada.
So we should really be focusingon the other species of
milkweed that are for here,because tropical milkweed is
also being found to move OEaround and infect monarchs.
So yeah, you got to be careful.
It's best to kind of stay localand stick with what should be
found in your area.
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Right, so you mentioned about butterfly
releases, so are there stillgroups out there that do
releasing of rear and releasebutterflies?
Speaker 4 (33:41):
Yeah, I think there are I don't know of too many
specifically anymore because alot over the years have stopped
doing it Um, but and there aresome that are still sold as
educational kits, you know, foreither teachers or other
educators or or even families,to be able to watch a
(34:01):
caterpillar go through its lifestages.
But again, I, we don't reallyadvocate that because of all of
the um, the, the, yeah, thepotential for moving disease
around, and it's just in thisday and age, with more science
now, and they, they have totallydone studies on it, everything.
It's just we should probably bedoing better practices than
(34:24):
that yeah, I know I did anotherpodcast and I mentioned this.
Speaker 3 (34:28):
There was, uh, happened to be in an event in
Thunder Bay, ontario, and I wasthe chief administrating officer
for the municipality in ThunderBay Invited me over.
He says, oh, jerry, what areyou doing tonight before your
event tomorrow?
I said no, I got nothingplanned.
He said, well, I'm having ablooming tonight.
Would you like to come over?
I said, what are you talkingabout?
(34:49):
And he said, well, I've got anight blooming primrose and it's
going to bloom tonight and ifyou'd like to come over and
watch it, it's kind ofinteresting to see.
And I was like, what are youtalking about?
Anyway?
So sure enough, I go over andthere it is and, just like he
said, you can tell that theflower was going to bloom that
(35:12):
night and it only blooms atnight and all of a sudden it
opens right in front of you andit's kind of neat to see.
But one of the things while Iwas there, he was showing me in
his garden and they had onemilkweed plant and he said, yeah
, the garden club up here istrying to assist the monarch
butterfly by planting milkweedsaround, and you know they were
(35:36):
selling milkweed seeds.
I said, oh yeah, how much.
What do you mean?
They were selling milkweedseeds.
How much did that cost you?
It was $10 a seed.
So I was shocked that $10 forone milkweed seed and anyway.
So they didn't know much aboutit.
But, lo and behold, I made surethat he had an abundance of
(35:57):
milkweed plants, which are fromnorthern Ontario, but so there's
a lot of groups out there thatare trying to assist in making
sure.
But we want to make sure thatsort of thing gets done
correctly.
Speaker 4 (36:07):
Oh, yes, that's true.
Yeah, so that's where I meanand we do now have more native
plant suppliers and greenhousesselling them or the seeds, which
is great, but again it would beit's always best to try and buy
something from local to you.
So if it is Northern Ontario,like, try to get some native
(36:31):
milkweed, shall we say, fromeither a nursery up there or
seeds harvested from reallynearby.
There are several species ofmilkweed.
So, yeah, just kind of like doyour research, make sure what
you're getting.
Some do better in differentregions than others, so, like
you might just even have bettersuccess with one over the other,
but that is certainly the bestthing we can do.
(36:54):
Like, a lot of people sometimeswant to buy caterpillars or
butterflies to release them, tohelp the butterfly or the
species, but that's not what'sgoing to help it long term, for
conservation, we need to beputting the habitat there and
then you'll be sustaining futuregenerations and it doesn't just
(37:16):
benefit those butterflies, itbenefits other insects and
wildlife.
So that's really what peopleneed to do Put in native plants
as many as possible, lots ofhost plants, and let's grow more
butterflies and bugs.
Speaker 3 (37:30):
So you mentioned about potential more details
about the butterfly farms inCosta Rica, and have you ever
been to one and seen how theyoperate?
Like I said, a huge greenhousesort of thing, or how do they do
it?
Speaker 4 (37:41):
Yeah, I've not had the chance to visit one myself.
As it turns out, I will thisyear in November.
I'm really excited to bevisiting our Costa Rica one.
So if you were to ask me a yearfrom now, I'm really excited to
be visiting our Costa Rica one.
So if you were to ask me a yearfrom now, I'll be able to say
yes.
But I know how some work andthey all can do it a bit
differently.
(38:02):
Some it could be a largeenclosed greenhouse where they
have all of the host plants andthey bring in some butterflies
periodically, let them lay eggs,they let them go and again to
be clear, this is all workingwith non-endangered species and
it is sustainable because itdoesn't deplete from wild stock
(38:25):
and it is all self-sustainingand whatnot.
But other butterfly farms itcould even be a bunch of smaller
, a small community, where theyjust have some of the plants
enmeshed with material to kindof keep some larvae there.
When they make the pupa theycollect them.
So they can do it in a varietyof ways.
(38:45):
It just kind of depends on thesetup and the size of the farm.
Speaker 3 (38:52):
And there are a number of these all around the
world.
From what I'm hearing, is thereany of that sort of structure
in Ontario or Canada that you'reaware of?
Speaker 4 (38:59):
No, that's something that in our temperate climate
hasn't really been feasible.
There are some in the southernUS, usually Florida, which often
rear US like Americanbutterflies, but not in Ontario
or Canada and again, because itreally was a model for
rainforest conservation.
(39:20):
That's just where the majorityof them are, but, yeah, anywhere
there are in Africa, there's acouple in Europe.
Apparently there's some inAustralia.
I haven't been able to sourcethem.
Asia, and then Central andSouth America are really hot
spots as well.
Speaker 3 (39:37):
So elaborate a bit more on the facility where
you're working at then.
So somebody coming in and whatare they going to expect and how
does it work there, and kind ofgive us a little bit of a
rundown.
Speaker 4 (39:46):
No problem.
So we buy admission ticketseither at the door or on our
website ahead of time, becausewe do like a lot of places these
days.
We do timed entry to manage,you know, crowd control and
traffic flow and everything, andthen you can enter and exit the
(40:10):
tropical greenhouse area whereall the butterflies are.
You can go in and out as manytimes as you want.
It's just some beautifulpathways and benches where
people can sit down.
You can really take your time.
You have to remember.
It is tropical, so we keep itbetween 26 to 28 degrees Celsius
year round, and in the summerwe've been in a heat wave for
(40:32):
much of July, it feels like.
So that means it's going to bereally hot in there as well.
So we often say like dress inlayers or wear bright colors
because butterflies might comeland on you.
But then again you have theother areas of our building to
explore, like the two galleriesand um and uh.
Average visit for people is anhour and a half or so, just with
(40:55):
all the things you can see anddo, um, and you can stay as long
as you want when you get hereright.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
So do you need to bring water or do you have a?
Those sort of things that youmake available to sell to people
, and stuff like that we have awater fountain?
Speaker 4 (41:08):
certainly that everyone can, because, yeah,
especially being a tropical kindof facility, we want people to
stay hydrated.
And then you can buy drinks orwater in the cafe as well.
But there's a water fountainwhere you can top up.
You can bring water.
Sure, no outside food isallowed, where the butterflies
are just again kind of relatedto containment and because of
(41:29):
all of our the free flyingnature of our animals there.
But you can certainly bringwater with you, yeah, right.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
So in the humidity, what would it be like in there?
Speaker 4 (41:40):
oh yeah, I, I try to keep it around 80 humidity.
Even 90 is great, um, because,again, most of the plants and
the butterflies and the otheranimals, they are tropical,
that's what they need.
So it is a very warm, welcomingenvironment and I think it's
really a neat place to come toin the winter.
(42:01):
We're really happy to be openyear round so you can come in
the middle of January and ifyou're sick of the snow and the
ice outside the middle ofJanuary and if you're sick of
the snow and the ice outside,you can come sit in a 27 degree
environment and have an escapefrom all that.
And I think that's pretty,pretty special.
Speaker 3 (42:21):
Now so do you have other sales and people buy hats
and shirts and all that kind ofstuff.
Speaker 4 (42:26):
Yeah, our gift store has a pretty wide variety of
souvenir type things clothing,games, books, a lot of them
educational as well gifty things.
We do weddings here too.
We do a lot of private events.
We're open for day public usebut we do a lot of things
(42:46):
wedding ceremonies andreceptions, bridal showers,
celebrations of life.
We're really special proposals.
People can book to have aprivate proposal here.
So we have often evening eventsgoing on as well.
Speaker 3 (43:03):
So do you get to deal with other insects as well?
Like this time of year is, Ithink, specifically a lot of
people and I was listening tothem again today cicadas and
things like that as well.
Do you end up with a lot ofquestions like that and your
people can answer stuff?
Speaker 4 (43:17):
Yeah, and I mean you know a lot of our staff.
They're not all entomologists,they're not all people who are
studying insects, but I mean wecertainly provide the basic
information.
All of us are nature nerds tosome extent and if there isn't
one staff who knows the answerto something, there's usually
(43:38):
somebody else like me or someoneelse around who can talk more
about that.
But yeah, we love to talk aboutany bugs we get questions about
cicadas, bees, wasps, birds,like you know, we're happy to
talk about it all, oh yeah.
Speaker 3 (43:54):
You mentioned you had birds inside the facility as
well.
Speaker 4 (43:57):
Yeah, we have a few.
They're mostly small finches.
I've got a couple canaries.
We have two nicobar pigeonswhich you might need to look
that up if you want to see aphoto.
They're beautiful green andblue.
We got them from the TorontoZoo.
We've got some quail on theground, but yeah, they kind of
they add to the environment.
As long as they don't eat thebutterflies, I am okay with them
(44:20):
being there.
Speaker 3 (44:21):
Yeah, well, it's the same.
I recall one of the things thatI did do research when I was
minister was dragonflies inOntario, because I was looking
to try and bring in an officialinsect of for the province of
Ontario, which it didn't have atthat time, and I thought that
the dragonfly would be a greatone for Ontario, and
particularly the, the, thedragon slayer dragonfly.
(44:44):
Have you ever heard?
Speaker 4 (44:44):
of it.
Yes, I have, I would.
I would vote for that one asbeing a great one, because
they're also more abundantfarther north you go, like in
northern Ontario, right.
Speaker 3 (44:54):
Yeah, they will Hudson's, james Bay lowlands,
but I didn't realize that theyactually migrate as well and
will migrate as far as Florida.
Speaker 4 (45:03):
Okay, I maybe didn't know specifically for that
species, but yes, it is truethat there are multiple species
of dragonfly that are migratory,some maybe not as far as others
, and I was just reading anarticle not that long ago that
we're still discovering morespecies of dragonfly are
migratory than we thought.
Speaker 3 (45:23):
Yeah, but the biggest drawback for it moving forward
and the whole discussion kind ofcame to a standstill was
because apparently the dragonslayer dragonfly will actually
eat monarch butterflies.
Yes, so I'm sure you don't haveany dragonflies or darning
needles and things like that inthe conservatory.
Speaker 4 (45:44):
No, and that's why I get that question occasionally.
Yeah, like, why don't you havedamselflies?
Or it would be really cool ifyou had dragonflies flying
around here too.
But then, yes, we have to tellpeople they are insectivores and
they would be preying upon thebutterflies, which is what most
people are coming to see.
So that's too much of aconflict of interest.
Speaker 3 (46:06):
Yeah me.
I would even tempt them a bitand say well, you know, if we
had dragonflies, we'd have toraise mosquitoes in here in
order for them to feed on themosquitoes, and I don't think
people want that.
Oh, I understand.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, because Iknow that's one of the biggest
things as soon as thedragonflies come out, the
mosquito population goes downimmensely.
Speaker 4 (46:27):
Yeah, totally.
Dragonflies are even moreefficient at mosquito control
than bats.
Speaker 3 (46:36):
Yes, they are, yeah, and people don't realize that.
So, and there's so manydifferent strains of dragonfly
in Ontario, which was veryinteresting.
So can you tell us?
I'm hearing different thingsabout fireflies.
Do you know much about them?
I hear that they're potentiallyin trouble.
I don't know about theenvironment that they live in,
which may cause them to be introuble, because I used to see
fireflies all the time and Ihave seen a couple of hatches,
(46:59):
one in central Ontario, kind ofbetween Halliburton and Bancroft
, where we have a place up thereand then I have another spot
where we see them.
But I heard something to thateffect that fireflies were in
trouble.
But I don't know if you haveheard anything like that.
Speaker 4 (47:12):
Oh yeah, I can speak to that.
They are in decline, some quiteto the worrisome degree, even
more than scientists thought.
I mean it's a bit of a sadstory.
I mean, you know, like most ofour insect populations are in
decline, which is extremelyconcerning, fireflies being one
(47:32):
of them, and it's a lot.
It's always due to pesticideswe use too many chemicals.
But for also firefliesspecifically, the first part of
their life is as larvae.
They hunt snails and slugs inthe leaf litter and we as humans
tend to want to make things tooclean and tidy and we disrupt
(47:57):
that habitat.
So that also doesn't help.
And then in their adult stage,as flying, glowing insects,
light pollution has also had anegative effect on them.
It disrupts their ability tocommunicate and find mates and
whatnot.
So it's chemical use, habitatloss and light pollution are
(48:18):
kind of the top three things fortheir decline.
Speaker 3 (48:21):
And I didn't realize that you mentioned snails and
slugs that they consume.
Speaker 4 (48:25):
Yes, they are predators.
They're also predatory as adultfireflies, although some adult
fireflies apparently don't feedat all.
But it's just another exampleof insects that depend on other
insects and invertebrates forfood, and we need lots of
invertebrates because they'refood for everything else.
Speaker 3 (48:48):
Yeah, so how do they feed on them?
I don't understand, I don'tknow.
Speaker 4 (48:53):
Sure, to describe a larval firefly, it would sound
pretty crazy.
They're bizarre looking thingslike a shield, they're covered
in shields, they're reallyarmored.
They're just kind of long andthin.
You hardly even see any legs,but they have a very pointy head
.
So from what I understand theyI mean, if it's a slug, that's
(49:16):
not as difficult they can kindof just walk up and they bite it
in the back of the head.
But for a snail they have tokind of like climb up, get past
the shell and, yeah, they kindof go and bite them at the back
of the head to kind of start toparalyze them and then they just
feast on them.
Speaker 3 (49:37):
I had no idea.
Yeah, there you go.
So for people who have concernswith slugs in their gardens,
fireflies is potentially one ofthe answers, if you can find a
way to it.
Now, how would somebody attractfireflies to their garden to
deal with their slug issue?
Speaker 4 (49:50):
Sure.
Well, again, I think the mainthing would be you have to let
it go a little messy.
You need to leave the leaves.
You know, that's something wehear a lot, but it really is
true.
You have to leave some debris,I mean even fallen dead tree or
bark or whatnot the leaves, or,sorry, the plants themselves,
(50:12):
like leaving stems or just snipthem and let them fall down, but
that's a big part.
And then no chemicals.
But attracting fireflies israther tricky because they're
predatory.
So as long as you just kind ofmake the habitat as welcoming as
possible, then you just kind ofhave to hope that adults would
be nearby and they lay theireggs and then they come and find
(50:33):
it.
Speaker 3 (50:35):
Interesting.
Now, if there's somethingthere's, suggestions you have,
because I know there is hugeconcern everywhere and everybody
I talk to about ticks and Lymedisease.
Yes, any suggestions alongthose lines how to deal with
those issues?
Speaker 4 (50:51):
Well, I could offer you some To deal with it in
terms of trying to keep ticksoff your property or dissuade
them.
I don't know how to do that.
That's too difficult, sorry.
Ticks are too easy to be movedaround or by other animals and
they're found in all differentkinds of habitats, so you're not
(51:14):
going to be able to kind ofkeep them from finding your
property.
But you can protect yourself inmany ways.
Um, I mean, I, I go outside allthe time and I've just gotten
in the habit now just alwaystuck your pants in your socks,
um just try to keep them fromsensing the CO2 from your skin.
(51:35):
You can wear DEET, but I alsofind natural essential oils like
lemon eucalyptus are alsoeffective, and you just kind of
have to get used to doing a tickcheck after you come inside and
um be aware and uh yeah,unfortunately they're just
(51:57):
spreading.
They're on the rise.
Speaker 3 (52:00):
Yeah, yeah.
Well, I've tried.
I've made suggestions to a fewabout about the potential
because, as you mentioned, aboutother animals moving them
around, if there was, you know,something we could put in our
bird feed, that the chipmunksand the squirrels and last night
I'm watching the rabbits eatthe sunflower seeds probably on
the ground from the bird feederthat they could eat, to turn
(52:21):
them off them.
It certainly would helpdecrease them being moved around
.
Quite a bit, I would think.
But that's something for otherpeople to think about.
Speaker 4 (52:29):
Well, one thing I can offer up is that possums have
been found to prey upon ticksquite heavily, so they've even
been nicknamed little tickvacuums.
So if we could make morehabitat welcoming for possums,
then they could help keep thosemaybe under control.
Speaker 3 (52:53):
Yeah, I had another person that said that banting
roosters consume ticks immenselyand so there was jurisdictions
in Ontario that were allowingpeople to have banting roosters
in their yard just to reduce thetick population.
But I've never verified that,although this person had a
pretty large organization ofabout I think his database was
(53:13):
about 45,000.
So, hopefully, but I found thatinteresting to hear.
Yeah, wow, Well, and the insectworld is so interesting.
You know, I briefly mentionedcicadas and that time of the
year that we're hearing them,but I happened.
It was right on the driveway Iwas coming in and there was a
wasp on the back of a cicada andthe two were just going at it.
(53:35):
The cicada was trying to getrid of the wasp and I believe
the wasp was trying to lay anegg on it, if I remember
correctly.
Are you familiar with that?
Speaker 4 (53:43):
I am One.
I'm quite jealous that you gotto witness that, because I have
never seen that behavior and Iwould really like to.
What you were seeing was a typeof wasp.
It's called the cicada killerbecause it doesn't lay its egg
on the cicada per se.
It actually was trying toparalyze it and carry it back to
(54:04):
its underground nest where theeggs were laid and the larva
will feed upon the cicada.
But the cicada killer wasp isone of our largest and it's
native and if people see it theyoften get quite alarmed because
of its size.
But I mean, it doesn't hurt us,it's not going after us.
It's just trying to find theadult cicadas to feed its young.
(54:26):
But I have yet to see one hunta cicada.
I'd love to see that.
Speaker 3 (54:32):
Well, it was amazing.
It was spinning around and itwas like a real battle going on
in the driveway and, yeah, itwas something to see.
Yeah, but these are all thingsthat, uh, people, if they just
take the time to enjoy andlisten and see in nature the
things that are out there, theytake a much better chance to
enjoy it.
And and you're you know, yourbutterflyfly Conservatory is one
way to enjoy that.
(54:53):
What else can people see here?
What kind of hours do you havethere?
Speaker 4 (54:56):
Sure, so we're open almost every day.
We just close on Mondays forpart of the year.
So just kind of check thewebsite to be sure.
But otherwise we're usuallyopen 10 to 5.
Sometimes we have extendedhours for holidays and whatnot.
And then last admission is at 4o'clock because, again, you
(55:16):
want at least an hour to enjoythe facility.
So it is highly recommended toget your tickets on our website
in advance to make sure you getyour time, because we have a
limited number of tickets.
And then, yeah, you can arriveanywhere between 10 to 4, stay
as long as you'd like.
If you come on a sunny day, thebutterflies are going to be
more active, right?
(55:39):
So you can keep that in mind.
I mean, they're always going tobe flying around, but I say
they're solar-powered, so thesunnier it is, the more they're
buzzing around everywhere.
And, yeah, our staff would behappy to bring out an animal for
you guys to meet.
You can ask lots of questionsand yeah.
Speaker 3 (55:58):
Yeah, you mentioned the giant centipede as one.
Yeah, so and Lynn, how do yousupport the facility?
I mean, it must cost a fair bitto bring in all these insects
and then keep the temperatureand like in cold weather and
things like that.
How do you financially keepthings in check there at the
facility?
Speaker 4 (56:17):
Yeah, we get minimal to no funding.
So it's just, yeah, we're kindof self-sustaining.
It's all based on our ticketsales and the events we do and
purchases from our gift storeand cafe and whatnot.
So you know, we really aregrateful for the support of
people who keep coming out.
(56:38):
We have memberships available.
If someone comes and they loveit so much, then you can get a
year long membership so you cancome as many times as you'd like
.
And but we, yeah, we're, we'rejust a independently owned local
organization.
And but, yeah, but we, yeah,we're just an independently
owned local organization.
And but yeah, you know,bringing in tropical butterflies
and the heating costs, they all, that's quite a bit.
Speaker 3 (57:01):
So do you have a newsletter or things like that
as well?
Speaker 4 (57:03):
We don't have a super regular newsletter right now.
We're really active on socialmedia, so if you do visit our
website, which iscambridgebutterflycom, you would
be invited to sign up foremails if you want.
But you're also probably bestto go to our Facebook or our
Instagram, because we're alwaysposting videos and photos,
(57:25):
because so much of what we doit's very visually appealing.
So we try to post lots of funpictures and videos so you get
snippets of what goes on hereand what you can see.
That would be kind of the bestway to keep in touch.
Speaker 3 (57:41):
Very good.
So, anne-lynne.
So how can people find out moreinformation or details about
the Cambridge ButterflyConservatory?
Speaker 4 (57:50):
So go to our website for a lot of information.
You know like frequently askedquestions what should I bring?
And to get your tickets?
So that'swwwcambridgebutterflycom, but
you could also give us a call ifyou want to talk through
anything.
Our number's on there too.
People can email me.
I'm the naturalist here, so I'mkind of the go-to if it comes
(58:13):
down to an ID question.
Like I saw a bug in my yard.
I don't know what it is.
I love getting pictures frompeople if they want to send a
photo or anything like that, butI think our website definitely
has a lot of the key info to getyou started.
Speaker 3 (58:28):
Very good.
Well, thanks very much.
We really appreciate all theinformation and I found it very
interesting and enlightening andlearning quite a bit about
butterflies in your facility andI think that this is just
something a little bit differentthat people are learning out
there under the canopy.
Thanks very much, Angela.
Speaker 4 (58:45):
Yeah, thank you.
It was so much fun to be ableto talk bugs with you.
Speaker 7 (59:10):
How did a small town sheet metal mechanic come to
build one of Canada's mosticonic fishing lodges?
I'm your host, steve Nitzwicky,and you'll find out about that
and a whole lot more on theOutdoor Journal Radio Network's
newest podcast, diaries of aLodge Owner.
But this podcast will be morethan that.
Every week on Diaries of aLodge Owner, I'm going to
(59:33):
introduce you to a ton of greatpeople, share their stories of
our trials, tribulations andinspirations, learn and have
plenty of laughs along the way.
Speaker 6 (59:44):
Meanwhile we're sitting there bobbing along
trying to figure out how tocatch a bass and we both decided
one day we were going to be ontelevision doing a fishing show.
Speaker 7 (59:54):
My hands get sore a little bit when I'm reeling in
all those bass in the summertime, but that might be for more
fishing than it was.
Punching you so confidently,you said hey, pat, have you ever
eaten a trout?
Find Diaries of a Lodge Ownernow on Spotify, apple Podcasts
or wherever you get yourpodcasts.
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