Red-spotted Purple Butterfly Eating Watermelon 2015

The Red-spotted Purple is an incredibly beautiful butterfly with its iridescence blue-green color.  It can be difficult to attract because it rarely comes to flowers and is best attracted with rotting fruit, scat, or tree sap.  This red-spotted purple butterfly showed up in my Topeka KS yard on Aug 15 2015 when I put out rotten watermelon in a bird feeding dish.  Note the watermelon also attracted flies. If you want red spotted purple butterflies don’t forget to supply their host plants in your yard.  The caterpillars feed on a wide range of trees such as wild cherry, cottonwood, willow, oak, and basswood.