Austin, Texas, is home to about 170 species of butterflies. It is also the home of the Austin Butterfly Forum, Inc., a non-profit organization dedicated to butterfly conservation and to enriching people's lives through butterflies. The Austin Butterfly Forum is a club that organizes field trips, conducts butterfly counts, promotes native gardening, performs conservation activities, and meets monthly for an educational presentation. We are a community of butterfly enthusiasts who also enjoy dragonflies & damselflies, bees, beetles, spiders and arthropods in general, and our meeting presentations span this gamut as well. Join Us!

Crimson Patch ovipositing, photo by Jim & Lynne Weber

Meetings are held in the Zilker Garden Center, 2220 Barton Springs Rd., Austin, TX, 78746 at 7:00 PM on the fourth Monday of each month except December.

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Oct. 20, 2018: Butterfly Count ** Note Changes **

The Butterfly Forum’s annual butterfly count is Saturday, October 20, 2018. Meet at Zilker Botanical Garden Center’s parking lot at 9 a.m. Please park in the greenhouse area. Directions: Enter the parking lot as normal, but drive around by the restroom. Just past the restroom is a gravel road that leads away from the parking lot to an open area near a greenhouse. We have permission to park there. NOTE: The parking lot on Stratford behind the garden will NOT be open, nor will the rear entrance to Zilker Garden be open.

Everyone is welcome, including all skill levels. Our focus is butterflies, but we also are interested in moths and other insects.

We plan to cover the Zilker Botanical Garden and Austin Nature Center, probably walking between these two places. We will drive to Lady Bird Wildflower Center in the afternoon (the admission there is $12 for adults and $10 for seniors).

We will chip in and order pizza for lunch and eat in one of the picnic areas at the Austin Nature Center. Or you can bring a sack lunch.

The count will go regardless of the weather. There is no alternate rain day.

Optional Early Bird moth lights: Gary St. Clair is going to run a moth light at the Austin Nature Center. Meet at the Nature Center beginning at 6:45 a.m Saturday morning. The light is set up on the second floor balcony of the 2-story building. You can park at the Nature Center’s parking lot off Barton Springs Road. We will then go to Zilker Botanical Center parking lot at 9 a.m.

For more information contact . Phone: 512.656.5848

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Oct. 22, 2018, 7 PM meeting: Native Host Plants for Texas Butterflies, presented by Lynne & Jim Weber.

While a wealth of native plant and butterfly field guides exist, ones that focus on the unique relationships between native plants and butterflies are few and far between. With the publication of Native Host Plants for Texas Butterflies, authors and photographers Jim & Lynne Weber, along with Ro Wauer, have filled this gap for Texas, beyond monarchs and milkweeds! Learn about these special relationships for butterflies (and some showy moths), explore why native plants are essential to healthy ecosystems, understand the role of nectar and host plants, and discover how these insects find the desired host plant species upon which to lay their eggs. You will leave with the knowledge and resources needed to encourage and appreciate a wider diversity of butterflies and moths in relation to their native host plants!

Lynne and Jim Weber are currently retired after long careers in the tech industry. Both are certified Texas Master Naturalists and Lynne is a past president of the Capital Area chapter. The Webers are dedicated naturalists who have served on the Balcones Canyonlands Preserve Citizens Advisory Council as well as on boards of the Big Bend Natural History Association, the Big Bend Conservancy, and the Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute. They conduct Golden-cheeked Warbler and Colima Warbler surveys, guide hikes, restore native habitat, map invasive plants, and manage their privately owned 8-acre preserve. Their nature photography and writing have appeared in several publications, and they have co-authored Nature Watch Austin (2011), Nature Watch Big Bend (2017), and Native Host Plants for Texas Butterflies (2018).