What's Happening with the Butterfly Experience at Brookside Gardens

We visit the Brookside Gardens Butterfly Exhibit and talk with conservatory manager Raymond Carter about how a glasshouse full of butterflies runs safely, legally, and beautifully. Along the way, we dig into butterfly biology, horticulture, and how this local attraction connects to real conservation work around the world. 
• what a butterfly exhibit is and what visitors can expect 
• what a conservatory manager does and how seasonal installations are planned 
• USDA permits, APHIS oversight, and why containment rules matter 
• how plant selection supports nectar feeding while avoiding host plants 
• horticulture as an intersection of design and science 
• butterfly vs moth differences including chrysalis vs cocoon 
• the hot, humid habitat and why it helps tropical species thrive 
• standout species like the blue morpho, paper kite, and giant birdwing 
• metamorphosis explained from egg to caterpillar to chrysalis to adult 
• why wings look so colorful and what scales do 
• what butterflies eat including nectar and decomposing fruit 
• biomimicry, monarch toxicity from milkweed, and viceroy lookalikes 
• how butterfly suppliers can fund reforestation and habitat protection 
• how to visit, buy tickets, and choose sensory-friendly or photography sessions 
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Transcript

Transcript

Derrick Kenny 0:00

Uh butterfly flying by. You can fly twice as high. Take a look at the Brook, Brookside Gardens butterfly exhibit. That's what's happening Moco. Next.

unknown 0:12

What?

Announcer 0:14

Good day and welcome to What's Happening Moco, an authentic, unscripted podcast from your Montgomery County government. Now, here's your host, Derek Kenney.

What The Butterfly Exhibit Is

Derrick Kenny 0:29

Good day, and welcome to What's Happening Moco. Today we're looking at butterflies at Brookside Gardens Butterfly Exhibit. And we have the pleasure of sitting down with the conservatory manager, Raymond Carter. Raymond, how are you today?

Raymond Carter 0:42

Very well. Thank you so much for being here.

Derrick Kenny 0:44

All right. Now what is what is a butterfly exhibit if for people that don't know or know what to expect?

Meet The Conservatory Manager

Raymond Carter 0:52

Um it's a wonderful opportunity to see a wide variety of butterfly and moth species in one uh enclosed space that you wouldn't see out in nature. Um and it's also an opportunity to learn about conservation and uh the ways in which a homeowner, for instance, could help with uh preserving butterfly species.

Derrick Kenny 1:14

So Ray, what does a conservatory manager do? And how did she become uh the servitory manager for Flipside Gardens?

Raymond Carter 1:22

Uh, well, uh to answer the first part of your question, hello. Um as a conservatory manager, what I do here is to oversee all of our programs. Um we do four seasonal installations within the South Conservatory, which is where we are right now. This is the longest running of them. It runs for six months, the butterfly experience. Um, but I also help to curate our permanent collection of tropical and subtropical species.

Derrick Kenny 1:51

Wow.

Raymond Carter 1:52

I work with uh other institutions, other botanical institutions, uh people throughout my horticultural network to uh So you're not you're not just the the jewel of Montgomery County, Maryland.

Derrick Kenny 2:02

You're you're able to provide your knowledge to other places or other locations around the county, around the country, absolutely.

USDA Rules And Containment Basics

Raymond Carter 2:09

The the horticultural industry is really fabulous because everybody it's not proprietary. Everybody wants to share what we know so that everybody else is caught up on the science and the the evolving uh world of conservation and all of the different uh programs that we operate. What is the USDA? We operate under USDA permits, so that's a big challenge in getting things here is bringing uh species from around the world over international borders under the USDA's watchful gaze.

Derrick Kenny 2:40

Oh wow, okay.

Raymond Carter 2:41

Um, but we we have a vendor in Florida who sends us domestic species right from here in the United States, and then we have a broker out of Denver that sends us all the international species. Like the United States Department of Agriculture? Absolutely, the USDA, and uh it's a subset of that APHIS, Animal Plant Health Inspection Services. Wow. So it's it's a strictly regulated um procedural uh operation, and so we have a lot of rules and regulations that we have to abide by, and that's why we try to make sure that all of our visitors are aware of the containment policies, like the short video that you saw when you were coming in. And we have a fabulous staff and over a hundred volunteers that help us run this exhibit from April to September. So it's a lot of hands, a lot of people, and it's a lot of knowledge that goes into training everybody. Because, for instance, uh butterflies have chemoreceptors in their feet, and that's how they find food. So it's bad if they land on you.

Derrick Kenny 3:42

Chemo, chemoreceptors. What does what's what's the easy way to say that for people that like me that don't really get it? What do you think?

Raymond Carter 3:49

Um it'd be like if you had taste buds on your feet.

Derrick Kenny 3:52

Oh, wow, okay.

Plants, Nectar And No Breeding

Raymond Carter 3:53

So it's how they uh seek out the nutrients that they need to survive, and that's ultimately what we want is to uh sustain these butterflies and to educate our visitors about them at the same time.

Derrick Kenny 4:05

So so how many different types of plants are here? Not an exact number, but just just to be able to provide the environment, proper environment for the different types of butterflies.

Raymond Carter 4:14

Uh in within this room, we have just under a hundred different species of plants. Oh, okay. Um, because as I was telling you before, it's important that we have different flower shapes and colors to draw and feed the different species of butterflies that go for nectar as their food source. Okay. Um so we want to be able to uh fulfill that need and um while also under our USDA regulations not having host plants. So we're we're prohibited from having any breeding here in the exhibit. So it's it's interesting dynamics. You have to make sure that you're following the guidelines, but you want it to be beautiful, you want to make sure the butterflies are fed, and you want to make sure everybody's having a good time.

What Horticulture Really Means

Derrick Kenny 4:56

Wow, and there's and there's people out there now, and maybe kids out there now that love butterflies, love bugs and plants and flowers, and and they hear this word horticulture and horticulturalist. Tell us a little bit about what is horticulture and what does a horticulturalist do? And this is wonderful seeing the butterflies come through. If you guys are listening to the podcast, make sure you go to Facebook or watch this on cable. These butterflies are active and beautiful. Okay, please.

Raymond Carter 5:21

Certainly. The the field of horticulture is a wonderful intersection between art and science. So the the science bit of it, of course, is plant physiology, organic chem chemistry, um, entomology, ecology, soil science, how how all of these things are. Soil science. You have to need you need to know how how nutrients and minerals are gonna be uh absorbed into plant systems and utilized by the plant, and what that means in terms of uh the insects within that ecosystem and how it all ties together. But then you also get to to bring in this this wonderful creative element of design, and you get to think about how plants are gonna work in in juxtaposition with one another and put together worlds, immersive worlds like this one.

Butterfly Vs Moth Plus Predators

Derrick Kenny 6:10

As I look around, there's people like we're we're here at an open exhibit. So people walking around, there's kids uh with their eyes wide open, I see like wows happening. What are some of the questions you get from the chitties or the uh people that come here?

Raymond Carter 6:25

Um, a wonderful question. I had a group of young people ask me just the other day, what is the difference between a butterfly and a moth? Oh wow, and it's so much fun to talk to people about this and to educate, you know, because uh for instance, moths are predominantly nocturnal, whereas butterflies fly around in the daytime. We have a lunomoth in the case just there behind you. Okay. Whoa! Isn't that cool? Yeah. That thing's big. Okay, and it it's it's fun to tell, you know, because the the lunomoth has these long curled hind wings, and that's to deter the echolocation of bats, which are its number one predator because it flies around at night when the bats are active.

Building The Hot Humid Habitat

Derrick Kenny 7:03

That goes back to the science of what you're doing here. Wow, that's amazing. It's amazing. It was a very beautiful creature there, and there's all these beautiful, colorful butterflies. There's netting above, there's um the butterflies around, and I noticed as I came in with this jacket that there's a certain temperature. Tell us a bit about what what type of environment have you shaped here uh for the um for the butterflies. Kind of describe it for people that are not able to see this environment.

Raymond Carter 7:30

It is hot and humid. I feel like you're being diplomatic about it, but it is a hot and humid environment, and that's because these species prefer those warmer temperatures, high humidity. That's how they thrive. And we, of course, want to keep the butterflies safe um for the enjoyment of all of our visitors.

Fan Favorite Species In The House

Derrick Kenny 7:47

Oh, that's fantastic. That's fantastic. Now, let's talk about some of the the star butterflies. There seems to be dozens of different types of butterflies in here. Is that the same number?

Raymond Carter 7:59

Oh, absolutely. We have uh more than that, actually. Uh we usually have anywhere from five to seven hundred butterflies flying within the exhibit at any any given time.

Derrick Kenny 8:10

Okay. Um and five to seven hundred species, not butterflies, species.

Raymond Carter 8:15

Oh, butterflies in particular. And then uh we have about 45 different species of butterflies in the exhibit. Okay. And like I said, that's a mix of domestic species from right here in the United States and from around the world. So Asia, Central and South America, Africa.

Derrick Kenny 8:32

Oh, wow. That's amazing. Now, what are some of the who are the rock stars? Who are the who are the ones that get now? You know, we're not going to shame any of the other butterflies that don't get as much notice.

Raymond Carter 8:42

They're all beautiful and I see your eyes every time a blue morpho goes past. That's right. That's the one. Everybody loves the blue morpho.

Derrick Kenny 8:50

And that's let's clarify. He said blue morpho. Okay, I know some of you out there may not have heard that correctly. The blue morpho, okay, yes.

Raymond Carter 8:55

The blue morpho butterfly has these vivid, vibrant blue wings. Okay, and they just capture everybody's imagination. It's uh Costa Rican native, they are uh a beautiful species. Um, but then we also have paper kite butterflies, they're delicate and they have uh a pale yellow to white wing with intricate dark lines on them. They look like stained glass windows.

Derrick Kenny 9:19

Oh, awesome.

Raymond Carter 9:20

Um, and then we also have the the giant bird wing, which is an Asian species. They look like giant, they almost look the size of bats, but they have bold yellow thorax.

Derrick Kenny 9:31

Okay. And what's what's a thorax?

Raymond Carter 9:33

Um, it's sort of the midsection of the body.

Metamorphosis And Wing Color Science

Derrick Kenny 9:35

Okay. Wow. So now we're now we're talking about the thorax. What what a butterfly is made of? Use some of the science terms and then use layman's terms so I can understand it. So if I see a butterfly, and I, you know, it has the different elements, the the eyes and the antennae and the all the things. Describe what a butterfly is and use all those great science terms and then just break it down for what we're looking at.

Raymond Carter 9:59

Certainly. Well, I mean, I mean, imagine the life cycle, which is kind of the most impressive thing about butterflies. Is they they start off as eggs and then they hatch in their larval state, they're caterpillars, and they eat and eat and eat so that they have enough energy to form a chrysalis around them where they metamorphosize into adult butterflies. In this process, they basically dissolve their entire form into this protein-rich goo and reassemble. Yeah, it's it's weird to think about. It is, and they reassemble into this entirely new creature that with these delicate wings that are covered in teeny tiny scales, and that's what you're seeing. Those are scales? There's scales.

Derrick Kenny 10:42

Like a fish scales. Not the same, I guess, density, but but scales nonetheless.

Raymond Carter 10:48

Scales nonetheless. And the different uh actual structure of those scales refracts and diffuses light on different wavelengths, and that's why they look these different vivid colors to our human eyes.

Derrick Kenny 11:02

Oh wow. So there's science to the beauty of butterflies. Oh, absolutely. Wow. Now what do they eat? You you mentioned, well, actually, before we get to that, there was one thing that a common misconception, oh well, at least the best misconception I had, butterflies, when they uh go through their metamorphosis, they you mentioned they're in a chrysalis, right? Not cocoons. That's right.

Raymond Carter 11:22

Uh moths have cocoons where butterflies have a chrysalis.

Fermented Fruit Diet And Behavior

Derrick Kenny 11:27

All right, cool, cool. And and during that time and they're in there in a goo and stuff, are they are they totally uh breaking down every component of their being? Like what what is that what is happening in there? Like, I know that you you described it, but can you just go a little a little bit deeper in there? Because it seems so amazing that this hairy little bug with all these legs will come back out to be this beautiful flying creature. Absolutely. Uh they basically have the building blocks programmed into their form. Okay. So when they dissolve, they basically have um discs that have pre-programming. I'm trying to think of the easiest way to describe it, but it's a complicated process. Um but they basically have that map so that when they disassemble, it automatically reassembles into this form that is capable of flight so that they can find a mate, which is the purpose of adult butterflies, is not to just to feed or to act as pollinators, but to to mate so that they can start the life cycle over again and lay more eggs.

Raymond Carter 12:28

Yeah, what are some of the things the butterflies eat? Some of our tropical species don't feed on nectar from flowers, they feed on rapidly decomposed uh decomposing fruit. Oh so you'll see trays of fresh fruit laid out and it's uh in the heat and humidity, it starts to decompose, and that's what the butterflies go for is this overripe fruit. Okay. So they they feed on those sugars, but you know what happens with fruit that's left out in the sun, rapid fermentation.

Derrick Kenny 12:55

Oh, really? Okay.

Raymond Carter 12:56

So some of the the blue morphos.

Derrick Kenny 12:59

The blue morpho, okay, yeah.

Raymond Carter 13:00

Yes, once they've been feeding on some fermented fruit for a while, you can find it.

Derrick Kenny 13:04

And they just fruit through.

Raymond Carter 13:06

They start chasing each other and acting more playful, so they could be a little tipsy, I don't know.

How Butterfly Buying Funds Conservation

Derrick Kenny 13:10

Wow, okay. So fermentation is kind of one of the processes that we humans use in making beer and other types of uh beverages that give us the same type of, I guess, satisfaction or enjoyment. Absolutely. For lack of a better term. That's wow. It's wild, some of the similarities that we have between butterflies and us. Um now, what what are some of the things that people don't ask about that you think they should know about the exhibit or about butterflies?

Raymond Carter 13:35

I would love to answer that. Um, so some of the people who rear the butterflies around the world are doing really important conservation work. So it's not just that we're having this beautiful environment where you can come and learn about butterflies, but the money that we spend to get those pupa from different places, they are investing in these amazing projects around the world. There's one of our vendors, um, El Bosque Nuevo out of Costa Rica. Wow. Okay. Every amount of profit they make, they invest in buying parcels of land attached to their property so that they can uh do reforestation of the Costa Rican rainforest. And they're within that, they're planting species that help with uh endangered uh migratory birds, and they're they're really putting a lot of thought into how to make the world better. So every little bit of money that we send them goes to that end, and that feels really good. You know, it's making these wonderful impacts all across the world.

Biomimicry And Monarch Lookalikes

Derrick Kenny 14:37

And this is just a beautiful place. And there's one thing I always try to uh want to do, and it doesn't always come across in audio. We talked about it a bit earlier. Let's talk about some of the different types of butterflies and what types of physical characteristics we can use to identify them. So the blue morpho, of course, is a bright is it a bright bluish kind of it is, it's this uh vivid um ceruleum blue.

Raymond Carter 15:06

Uh but some some butterflies employ different mechanisms for their survival, for mating. Um, so some use biomimicry, the owl butterflies, for instance. If you look at them biomimicry, that's a big word.

Derrick Kenny 15:21

What does that mean?

Raymond Carter 15:23

Uh that means employing strategies based on other living things for your own survival. So uh taking on the appearance of something else. So the owl butterfly is is so termed. Hello.

Derrick Kenny 15:38

You have to get him get him a talent release. That's okay. Hey. He's okay, he's fine. That's fine. Okay.

Raymond Carter 15:44

Um that was cool. But that I know, I like when kids want to interact. That's right. Um, the owl butterfly, their uh forewing looks like a snake's head, and their hindwing has a giant eye spot that looks like an owl's eye. Wow. Now, a snake and an owl, you would want to avoid, right? If you were a bird or a reptile. So the things that would eat that butterfly, it has adapted this biomimicry defense to look like things that would scare them away.

Derrick Kenny 16:14

So the beautiful designs and oftentimes are have purpose other than just looking good to our eyes.

Raymond Carter 16:21

Absolutely. Well, I don't think any of it is intended for human eyes, you know? It's to attract mates within their same species, to uh worn off um territorial uh other insects with their vivid colors and like the the native monarch butterflies. Their bright orange color alerts birds that they're a poisonous species because they feed on Asclepius, which is um milkweed. Okay, and milkweed has a poisonous sap that runs through it.

Derrick Kenny 16:52

So whoa, whoa, we I'm connecting things here. You said that sounds that's a local butterfly. Yeah, yeah. And so the local plant and it's poisonous and they there are lots of, yeah. Oh gosh, okay. Let's let's okay, it's starting to get more monarch butter butterfly, okay. Monarch butterflies uh feed on Asclepius, which is milkweed. Okay, and it makes them intrinsically toxic. So birds avoid them. But here's the thing that orange color birds know as a toxic butterfly that they shouldn't eat. So then the viceroy butterfly has adapted to look like a monarch butterfly. So it is also that vivid orange and black coloration, okay, but it is not a toxic butterfly. So it's just different methods of survival.

Where Brookside Is And What To Expect

Raymond Carter 17:33

That's amazing how complex and purposeful biology um can be or horticulture can be. Oh yes, yeah. Absolutely.

Derrick Kenny 17:42

Now, we're here at the uh butterfly garden, bookside gardens, not everyone knows where it's located. Uh, where we locate it, um, how do people get here?

Raymond Carter 17:51

Absolutely. We are right in the heart of Wheaton, Maryland. Um, the address is 1500 Glen Allen Avenue. Okay. Uh in the conservatory, you can't miss it. It's a big house of glass, uh, right at the bottom of the property.

Derrick Kenny 18:04

So it's a huge, beautiful greenhouse. It is warm. So if you guys get here and it's still springtime, and it's 50 degrees outside of the conservatory, it is not 50 degrees on the inside. Is that correct?

Raymond Carter 18:15

Is it safe to say? That is true. That's that's kind of the beauty of a glass house. Uh the sunlight comes in and we call that solar gain. Okay. So the temperature is trapped inside. Yeah. And we do vent, so we don't we don't want it to get up to like 120 degrees, but we keep it hovered right around uh 80 to 85 degrees in here.

Derrick Kenny 18:34

Wonderful. So it's a wonderful, warm, safe, beautiful environment to come bring your family in the safe and wonderful and enjoyable for the butterflies. They get to uh eat all the fermented fruit they want and fly around and um all the nectar. And what are those things called again they use to um taste their taste buds in the hemoreceptors. Hemo hemoreceptors. Yes. So they get to enjoy either hemoreceptors, all the beautiful nectar here, or the um fermented fruits that are here. So if you come across rotten fruit in the in the in this house here, in this conservatory, don't eat it. Please don't eat it. Don't eat anything, really. Yeah. Because somewhere in here there's going to be milkweed, right? Is there?

Raymond Carter 19:16

No, and that's a good point. We we are not allowed to have host plants within this exhibit. Because again, we're not allowed to have any breeding of the butterflies. Okay. So that's part that's stipulated in our USDA permits.

Derrick Kenny 19:29

Wow, okay. And so their diets prohibit prohibit them from kind of um being productive within this environment, more or less.

Raymond Carter 19:37

Well, so the if they laid eggs, the caterpillars have a specific relationship to plants. That's what a host plant is. It's um a certain species of plant that's related to a certain species of butterfly. Okay, got it. So you have to know, and we have to cross-reference every plant that comes into this exhibit to make sure it's not a host plant on which a caterpillar would be able to survive.

Derrick Kenny 20:00

That's a whole birds and bees discussion. We don't want to go too far to that. No. So you wouldn't be the first. But yeah. But it's it's amazing how complex it is. You just think, uh, because you can simply come here and enjoy the butterflies, but you have people here with knowledge, experience, and education to help you know the deeper under a deeper understanding of what's going on within the conservatory. What what what what are the thorax? What is happening with the scales on a butterfly wing? Yeah, what types of different butterflies there are, what type of plants are feeding them, and all those things. Now, is there a website or something that you want people to go to for more information to learn more about you, about the um exhibit, about the Brookside Gardens?

Raymond Carter 20:40

Yeah, absolutely. On our um Montgomery Parks website, you can come and you can actually pre-purchase tickets to this exhibit. All right. Um, and then there uh there's a lot of information around what and where and how. And I should mention also, we have two different programs that we offer within this exhibit. Okay. Because right now you're in the middle of general admission. All right. But we do also have a sensory-friendly butterfly experience, which we offer uh to um people with a neurodivergence that might be overstimulated in high crowd areas. And then we also do a focus on butterflies program, and that is an hour and a half of unimpeded uh access to the butterflies for our uh photographer friends. Oh wow, that's great. So they can come in and set up and get those really gorgeous shots without, you know, kids running around past them.

Derrick Kenny 21:33

Oh, that's awesome. That's awesome. So, and to do that again, they go to the website to assign and do that in advance. And so if you're a photographer or you're someone that appreciates the beauty of butterflies, or you just want to have a nice family outing, you come to Brookside Gardens, the butterfly experience. Yes. Butterfly experience here at Brookside Gardens, and ask for Raymond, the conservatory manager, and he will make sure that you have a great experience and have a good time. Here. Um, and again, that uh go to the parks website.

Raymond Carter 22:04

Yes, absolutely.

Derrick Kenny 22:05

All right, to get the information of how to get here, and there is a nominal it's a nominal fee associated with the exhibit.

Raymond Carter 22:11

Uh tickets are $15.99 for adults, okay, um, $10.99 for uh children, and uh children under three or free.

Derrick Kenny 22:23

All right, wonderful, wonderful. And uh what what what are the hours of operation?

Raymond Carter 22:28

We're open daily from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Uh straight through September 7th. That'll be the last day of our exhibit.

Derrick Kenny 22:36

Oh wow. Is there a reason for that?

Raymond Carter 22:37

Does it start getting too cold or uh yes, it does. It starts to get too cold to uh support these tropical and subtropical species, uh, but we also uh have different programs. Okay. So up next after this, we do a uh chrysanthemum festival that we call Autumn Embers. Oh wow, okay. It's uh bright vibrant colors of the autumn season. Then we go into a garden railway, uh, which is in partnership with the um W W V M G R S, the Washington, Virginia, Maryland uh Railway Society. And so they come in and they build this giant in world of uh model trains. Oh, really?

Derrick Kenny 23:20

Oh, ooh.

Raymond Carter 23:21

Yeah, it's super cool. And then uh after that, we do an early spring show uh that we um call the midwinter delight. So in that season where it's cold and snowy and miserable outside, we have a wonderful world.

Derrick Kenny 23:34

So people can come and visit this environment all year long, but now, right now, it's all about the butterflies, right?

Raymond Carter 23:40

It's all about those butterflies, absolutely.

Derrick Kenny 23:42

And that's what's happening, Moco. Uh, take a look at the brook, Brookside Gardens butterfly exhibit. Come and meet the fine faculty here in a wonderful 43 different varieties of butterfly flying around and having a great time. And that's what's happening, Moco. And be sure to subscribe, like, and share.

Announcer 24:03

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