Butterflies lay eggs anytime they've got eggs in them, which is nearly always when the weather is warm. In my area, they lay eggs from early March (sleepy oranges) until late in the fall.

I can't imagine why anybody would say they only lay eggs in spring! You wonder what possesses people who know nothing about butterflies to post such things!

The butterflies that use maypops and/or P. caerulea/blue crown passionvine usually lay them in early summer through fall in my area, but on occasion, they've showed up in spring to lay them. Gulf and variegated fritillaries are the ones who use it here, but in south Florida (and maybe south Texas and other places) zebra longwings use passionvines.

Sherry

This post was edited by misssherry on Mon, May 19, 14 at 16:47

Thank you Sherry! That eases my mind a lot!

Just out of curiosity, do you feel like they use one of the two (maypops or blue crown) better than the other? I'm thinking about getting one or two plants and placing them about 35 feet from my actual "butterfly garden" so they don't take over everything (my butterfly garden is not that large). The nursery here carries both, so, I can get one of each or just one or two plants of the same kind.

In my area they prefer maypops/P. incarnata, but others on this forum have said in their area they prefer P. caerulea. As I recall, most of the P. caerulea 'preferers' come from Oklahoma and north Texas, but my memory may be wrong. Both are great and used by gulf and variegated frits!

Maybe somebody in your area will post and say which is best in the DFW area.

Sherry