Tattered Beauty

I found this butterfly at the beginning of the nature trail on one of my recent short hikes. It was flying from on Queen Ann's Lace plant to another. The first thing I noticed was that it would land for longer periods of time than most other butterflies.

A butterfly is usually a very elusive creature. They don't appear to have much speed but they never seem to stop moving. It can be very frustrating chasing a butterfly in the hopes of getting a picture. But not this one. It was content to just rest there right in front of me on these flowers.

This was a good sized butterfly; about as wide as my hand. So it was obviously easy to see. And what I saw was that it seemed to be sitting in a strange way. Not really very noticeable at first, but when you take in the whole picture you might think so. The poor thing was in tatters.

Other than the butterfly looking like a crumbling leaf, it seemed healthy enough. It was able to fly around just fine. And it would go fr4om flower to flower. It would spin slowly around on the flower as most butterflies like to do. Watch closely for this behavior some time. And the tattered condition just didn't seem to hinder its flight.

There are several things that could cause this ragged look. Maybe another animal attacked it, or there were several attacks. All unsuccessful, I might add. Maybe it is just from normal wear and tear of a lifetime. Think about what any animal in later stages of life might look.

But the main thing I noticed about this butterfly was that even with this tattered condition it was still a beautiful creature. I think of butterflies as the flowers of the animal kingdom. And maybe this butterfly was old, but it was still was a beautiful flower, just like the others.

Youth is generally associated with beauty, but is that always the real story? Maybe we think that way because youth symbolizes strong life. The real beauty is in life. Life is what we see as beauty when we dig down to our depths and really think about it. Life is our greatest gift. It's as precious and as delicate as this butterfly.


Nature Center Magazine - Today's Free Wallpaper brings us the return of the photos of Steve of Out On The Prairie. He's an excellent photographer with a vast knowledge of nature. Take a look!