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🦋Monarch Butterfly lifecycle & metamorphosis. It w

🦋Monarch Butterfly lifecycle & metamorphosis. It won’t be long now!

Here’s what a monarch actually goes through, start to finish:

🥚 Egg: Laid on milkweed (and only milkweed). Hatches in about 3-4 days.

🐛 Caterpillar (larva):This is the growing stage. They molt 5 times as they get bigger, called “instars.” Takes about 10-14 days.

🌀 The J :Once fully grown, the caterpillar hangs upside down in a J shape for about a day before its final molt. This is the most vulnerable point no legs gripping the leaf, nothing to defend itself with. This is exactly where mine disappeared from.

🟢 Chrysalis (pupa):After that last molt, it forms a jade-green chrysalis. Inside, it completely transforms (metamorphosis) even its mouth changes shape. This takes about 8-14 days.

🦋 Adult butterfly:Emerges with crumpled wings, pumps fluid into them, and needs about an hour to dry before it can fly.

Have you ever had a monarch chrysalis in your garden? Tell me how it went 👇

Be sure to follow along @michellesgardengrows to follow the monarch caterpillar journey 🐛

#monarchchrysalis #monarchbutterflies #metamorphosis #lifecycle

If you’ve been thinking about a GreenStalk, raised

If you’ve been thinking about a GreenStalk, raised beds, or seed starting supplies, now is a great time! 🌱🍂

use my GreenStalk throughout the growing season:
🌱Spring: lettuce, cilantro & parsley
☀️Summer: bush beans & basil.
🍂Fall: lettuce, bok choy & kale

It's such a great way to grow a lot in a small space, and I love being able to switch out what I grow with the seasons.

💸Epic Gardening’s Labor Day Sale is here with 15–25% off select bundles, plus my code MGG5 gives you an extra 5% off! 🙌

🌱 Vertical Planter Bundles
🌱 Raised Bed + Irrigation Bundles
🌱 Seed Starting Bundles

If you’re getting ready for your fall garden or planning ahead for next season, this is a good one to check out!

👉 Epic Gardening Labor Day Sale🌱

Disclosure: I’m an Epic Gardening affiliate. I may earn a small commission if you purchase through my link or code, at no additional cost to you.
🌱💚@michellesgardengrows

#epicgardening#labordaysale #fallgarden #verticalplanters #gardening @epicgardening @egambassadors

Who else loves September? I love the September gar

Who else loves September? I love the September garden, but it’s bittersweet because I know the time is growing near that the garden will be put to sleep.

Follow along 👉@michellesgardengrows for more garden harvests & insights🌱

#septembergarden #september #harvesting #raisedbedgardening

So glad I was wrong about the caterpillar missing.

So glad I was wrong about the caterpillar missing. I guess I just totally missed it and I sure wish I would’ve got to witness the process of the change.

Here’s what a monarch actually goes through, start to finish:

🥚 Egg: Laid on milkweed (and only milkweed). Hatches in about 3-4 days.

🐛 Caterpillar (larva):This is the growing stage. They molt 5 times as they get bigger, called “instars.” Takes about 10-14 days.

🌀 The J :Once fully grown, the caterpillar hangs upside down in a J shape for about a day before its final molt. This is the most vulnerable point no legs gripping the leaf, nothing to defend itself with. This is exactly where mine disappeared from.

🟢 Chrysalis (pupa):After that last molt, it forms a jade-green chrysalis. Inside, it completely transforms — even its mouth changes shape. This takes about 8-14 days.

🦋 Adult butterfly:Emerges with crumpled wings, pumps fluid into them, and needs about an hour to dry before it can fly.

I’ve still have a few more caterpillars on my swamp milkweed getting ready for their own J stage soon. This time, if I catch one wandering off to pupate, I’m keeping my eyes on it!

Have you ever had a monarch chrysalis in your garden? Tell me how it went 👇

Be sure to follow along @michellesgardengrows to follow the monarch caterpillar journey 🐛🦋

#monarch #monarchbutterfly #chrysalis #gardeningforwildlife #savethemonarchs

👋👋👋 Goodbye, August. See you next year! 🌿 Most of

👋👋👋 Goodbye, August. See you next year! 🌿

Most of my videos in the garden are me sweaty, dirty, and definitely not camera-ready… so every now and then, I have to give you a cleaner version with a proper hat from @tulahats 😂🌸

#august #garden #gardeninginspiration #growyourfood

Part 3 of this monarch journey didn’t go the way I

Part 3 of this monarch journey didn’t go the way I hoped 🦋 but it got me digging into the whole life cycle.

Here’s what a monarch actually goes through, start to finish:

🥚 Egg: Laid on milkweed (and only milkweed). Hatches in about 3-4 days.

🐛 Caterpillar (larva):This is the growing stage. They molt 5 times as they get bigger, called “instars.” Takes about 10-14 days.

🌀 The J :Once fully grown, the caterpillar hangs upside down in a J shape for about a day before its final molt. This is the most vulnerable point no legs gripping the leaf, nothing to defend itself with. This is exactly where mine disappeared from.

🟢 Chrysalis (pupa):After that last molt, it forms a jade-green chrysalis. Inside, it completely transforms — even its mouth changes shape. This takes about 8-14 days.

🦋 Adult butterfly:Emerges with crumpled wings, pumps fluid into them, and needs about an hour to dry before it can fly.

The hard truth: less than 10% of monarchs survive from egg to adult butterfly in the wild. Birds, wasps, ants, and disease all play a role it’s just nature doing its thing, and the odds are stacked from the very start.

I’ve still got a few more caterpillars on my swamp milkweed getting ready for their own J stage soon. This time, if I catch one wandering off to pupate, I’m bringing it inside to a mesh enclosure so it has a fighting chance.

Have you ever moved a caterpillar or chrysalis indoors to protect it? Tell me how it went 👇

be sure to follow along @michellesgardengrows to follow the monarch caterpillar journey 🐛🦋

#monarch #monarchwatch #savethemonarchs #gardeningforwildlife

Watching this guy get ready to become a butterfly

Watching this guy get ready to become a butterfly has been fascinating. 🦋

I planted these swamp milkweeds from @gardenforwildlife and they’ve been a favorite with my monarchs every year & especially this season.

I’ve had six caterpillars on one plant! And this seems to be the second round because I had several a month ago.

Monarchs spend about 9–14 days as caterpillars, moving through five instars. The 5th instar is their final caterpillar stage, and then they leave the milkweed to find a safe place to pupate.

Once attached, they enter the prepupal J stage, then molt into a chrysalis, which typically lasts another 8–15 days before the butterfly emerges.

Now I’m watching my dahlia for the next part of the story. 💚🦋

🔎Source: Monarch Joint Venture, Monarch Life Cycle & Growth and Development

👉follow along @michellesgardengrows to see what happens next!

This is part One of my monarch caterpillar & swamp

This is part One of my monarch caterpillar & swamp milkweed saga! My swamp milkweed was from @gardenforwildlife about 4 years ago and it’s the plant that keeps giving because I’ve had monarch butterflies visit, lay their eggs & raise their young on it every single year!

Be sure to follow @michellesgardengrows as the story unravels!

#gardenforwildlife #monarchcaterpillar #swampmilkweed #wildlifegardening

This is what it looks like to garden without pesti

This is what it looks like to garden without pesticides.

Sometimes, gardening well means knowing when NOT to plant. 🌱

I waited until mid-July to plant my cucumbers this year, and this is already my second harvest! 🥒

By waiting, I was able to avoid some of the early cucumber beetle pressure and have a fresh crop producing later in the season.

It’s a reminder that planting isn’t just about what you grow it’s also about when you grow it.

Gardening pesticide-free means planting with intention, paying attention to what your garden is telling you, and being willing to do things differently.

Have you ever tried delayed planting? Let me know in the comments! 🌱

🗂️Save this from the future and follow along @michellesgardengrows for more gardening insight🥒

#cucumber #cucumberbeetle #pesticidefreegardening #gardentipsandtricks

🌸 A gardening lesson I didn’t expect… Aster Yellow

🌸 A gardening lesson I didn’t expect… Aster Yellows.

This coneflower (Echinacea) is one I grew from seed three or four years ago, and I’ve loved watching it come back and get bigger each season.

But this year, something is very wrong.

The plant has developed symptoms that are consistent with Aster Yellows a disease caused by a phytoplasma, a bacteria-like organism that interferes with the plant’s normal growth. It is spread from plant to plant by leafhoppers as they feed.

One of the telltale signs is that the flowers can become small, distorted, or strangely green, while the plant may develop yellowing, stunted growth, or unusual clusters of weak shoots called “witches’ broom.” Aster yellows can affect many plants in the daisy family, including coneflowers. (University of Minnesota Extension)

And unfortunately, once a plant is infected, there isn’t a treatment that will cure it.

So as hard as it is, this is one of those gardening moments where I have to let go of a plant I’ve grown and enjoyed for years. 💔

I’ll be removing the affected coneflower rather than leaving it in the garden, because infected plants can serve as a source of the phytoplasma for leafhoppers to spread to other susceptible plants.

This is gardening. 🌱😭

We plant.We nurture.
We learn. And sometimes we have to remove something we love to protect the rest of the garden.

Have you ever seen Aster Yellows in your garden?

#plantdisease #gardentips #gardeningforbeginners #coneflower #astersyellows

No rattlesnakes allowed here except for rattlesnak

No rattlesnakes allowed here except for rattlesnake pole beans by @reneesgardenseeds

These pole beans will have a permanent place in my garden.

Let me know if you’ve grown these before or what your favorite bean to grow is!

🗂️ save this for next season when you’re ready to plant pole beans & 👉Follow along @michellesgardengrows for more garden inspiration

#gardeninginspiration #polebeans #beginnergardener #garden

Are you team Pole or Bush when it comes to green b

Are you team Pole or Bush when it comes to green beans? I’m definitely both and I love succession sowing them in my garden.

#gardentok #beans #growyourfood #beginnergardener

Turns out gardening helped me grow more than plan

Turns out gardening helped me grow more than plants⬇️

It’s helped me grow Garden Friends like @lexiskitchengarden & @happyheartgardens and others listed below⬇️

Back in 2021, @lexiskitchengarden invited me into a gardener group chat with 12+ other women (I tagged the group individually below to see if you know any of them ). We started by sharing gardens, but it became so much more.

We’ve became a little gardening community because of Instagram!

Birthdays are remembered & When life gets hard, we show up for each other too in the group chat. ❤️

We garden in different zones. Lexi and Rebecca have a few years ahead of me on gardening.

I’ve learned so much from them & the others. What works, what doesn’t in our own respective gardens.

We’ve also cheered each other on in content creation & in real life stuff too.

This year, the friendships went in “real life” 🚗 from Virginia ➡️Maine to ➡️ Alabama

📍 Maine: finally took the trip we’d talked about for years, and got to see Lexi’s garden (and her gorgeous Airbnb @thistlepondcottage ) as well as her husband, Hamish and her two Great Danes, Atlas and Leah in person!

📍 Alabama: my husband’s conference in Pensacola turned into a lunch date and a mini tour of Mobile with Rebecca @happyheartgardens

Social media gets a bad reputation. But it gave me garden friends from all over 🎉

I hope you also get to GROW together with people who’ll encourage & inspire you too. 🌿

And if these ladies have encouraged you in anyway, let them know in the comments💚

It was so nice to finally meet Alexia and Rebecca in person. It’s so fun to GROW TOGETHER!

💚Michelle @michellesgardengrows

@sheilas_kitchen_garden @hilltop.hygge.homestead @mywestcoastgarden @juliadimakos @prosperous_living @humblehippiehomestead @brick_house_blooms @where_she_blooms @hellomarigoldcollective
#gardenfriends #growtogether #foundmypeople #gardeningcommunity

🍕 Patty Pan Squash Pizzas! 🍕 If your garden is gi

🍕 Patty Pan Squash Pizzas! 🍕

If your garden is giving you more pattypan squash than you know what to do with, turn them into these little veggie pizzas! They’re easy, delicious, and a fun way to use up your harvest. 🌱

🍕 Recipe

Ingredients:
• 4–6 small pattypan squash
• 1–2 Tbsp olive oil
• Salt + pepper
• ½ cup pizza sauce or marinara
• 1–1½ cups shredded mozzarella
• Your favorite pizza toppings
• Italian seasoning or oregano
• Optional: Parmesan, fresh basil & red pepper flakes

On the Blackstone/grill:
1️⃣ Slice squash into about ½-inch rounds (or halve very small squash).
2️⃣ Brush both sides with olive oil and season with salt & pepper.
3️⃣ Grill over medium heat for about 3–5 minutes per side, until tender and browned but still firm.
4️⃣ Add pizza sauce, mozzarella and your favorite toppings.
5️⃣ Place them back on the grill and cover if possible. Cook another 3–5 minutes, until the cheese is melted and toppings are heated through.
6️⃣ Finish with fresh basil, Parmesan or Italian seasoning.

🔥 Oven option: Roast at 425°F for about 10–15 minutes, flip, and continue until tender and lightly browned. Add toppings and return to the oven for another 5–8 minutes, until the cheese is melted and bubbly.

Garden-to-table tip: Keep those squash slices thick enough to hold the toppings they’re your little “pizza crusts”! 🍕🌱

Would you try these with your garden squash? 👇

#pattypan #squash #gardenrecipes #eatwhatyougrow #kitchengardening

Need a quick birdbath setup? Look no further🐤 I n

Need a quick birdbath setup? Look no further🐤

I needed to add a water source to my garden to help meet the requirements for a National Wildlife Federation Certified Wildlife Habitat. 🐦💦

So I added this birdbath! It gives the birds a place to drink. I hope they use it.

Even if they don’t, it adds a really nice touch to the garden.

FYI: I did buy the solar pump separately.

If you’re looking for something similar, comment BIRD and I’ll send the link straight to your DMs!

Happy Garddning 💚Michelle

#birdbath #waterfeature #gardenforwildlife #backyardgardener

Did you know this about fennel? 🐛 Are you growing

Did you know this about fennel?

🐛 Are you growing fennel? If so, have you ever had black swallotail butterfly caterpillars visit?

#fennel #growingherbs #blackswallowtailcaterpillar #habitatgardening

When cucumber vines take off, a little guidance go

When cucumber vines take off, a little guidance goes a long way. 🥒🌿

Keeping those fast-growing vines supported helps:
✨ Prevent vines from becoming tangled or weighed down
✨ Keep growth more manageable
✨ Improve airflow around the plant
✨ Make harvesting easier

A few minutes of tending now can save you a lot of frustration later. 🌱

📌 Save this for your next cucumber check!
🫱 Follow for more 5 minutes in the garden simple garden tips.

#fiveminutesinthegarden #cucumbers #gardeningtipsandtricks #beginnergardening

🥒 Cucumber pollination 101 🌼 Female flower: tiny

🥒 Cucumber pollination 101

🌼 Female flower: tiny cucumber-shaped ovary behind the flower
🌼 Male flower: pollen-producing flower without the swollen ovary

🐝 Normally, bees transfer pollen between them, but when pollination is incomplete, that tiny cucumber may yellow, shrivel, and drop.

🖌️ Hand-pollination is simply giving the female flower a little help by transferring pollen from the male flower to the female flower’s stigma.

💡 Tip: Try it in the morning when both flowers are freshly open.

📌 Save this for future reference!

👉 follow along to watch these cucumbers grow

#cucumberplant #handpollination #gardeningtipsandtricks #beginnergardener

One of my favorite things about growing bush beans

One of my favorite things about growing bush beans? They’re just so easy. 🌱💚

I succession sow them throughout the summer, which means I can keep coming back for fresh harvests instead of getting one big crop all at once.

And having them growing in my GreenStalk vertical planter on the deck makes it even better. I’m just a few steps from my back door, so when it’s time to harvest, I can grab my basket and go. 🧺

These Blue Lake Bush Beans from @botanical_interests have been such a productive addition to the garden!

Easy to grow + easy to harvest + right outside the back door = a win in my garden. 🌿

#packetplantharvest #verticalplanter #bushbeansarethebest

🌱 August is NOT too late to start your fall garden

🌱 August is NOT too late to start your fall garden!
I’m gardening in Zone 7B in Southwest Virginia, with a first frost around October 27 & there’s still plenty of time to get a fall garden growing. 🍂

Here’s what I’m planting right now:

🥕 Direct sowing • Radishes • Beets

🫘 Succession sowing • Green beans

🌱 Starting in seed trays • Kale • Swiss chard • Bok choy • Lettuce

⏳ Waiting a little longer • Snap peas; I’ll sow these toward the end of August when temperatures are cooler

The key to fall gardening is knowing your first frost date and working backward from there. Your planting dates may look different from mine, but you may have more time than you think!

📌 Save this for your fall garden planning and tell me below: What are you planting for fall?

#fallgarden #growyourownfood #seeds

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