Krohn Conservatory to present ‘Butterflies in Space’ in May

Every spring, thousands of free-flying, colorful butterflies greet guests at Krohn Conservatory during its annual Butterfly Show. This year’s Butterfly Show, called “Butterflies in Space,” will open May 11.

“The Butterfly Show is an annual exhibit that we put on every year. Usually, it’s in the spring but this year, we moved it a little later. It starts on May 11 and lasts through Aug. 18,” says Mark House, manager at Krohn Conservatory.

He says butterflies are more active when it’s sunnier and warm. When it’s cooler, the butterflies tend to hang out in the trees, and they are not as visible to guests. Moving the show to May more closely matches the environment the butterflies come from. Plus, there’s more daylight and this gives the butterflies more energy to fly around and have a happy life at the Krohn Conservatory.

This year’s theme, “Butterflies in Space,” was inspired by the four painted lady butterflies who flew aboard the space shuttle Atlantis to the International Space Station in 2009.

“We read about the story of the painted lady butterflies that were taken up to the International Space Station, where they grew and lived their lives. People up there in space studied how they interacted in zero gravity and the effects of that. It was very interesting. So, my staff and I were talking about the fact that there are butterflies up in space. Then, we did some research and we found out it’s not just butterflies in space, but there are other galactic objects like the butterfly nebula, and it does look like a butterfly,” House says.

There will be everything from photo ops to planets and stars hanging from the ceiling, and a star tunnel that guests can walk through, and much more.

“It’s going to be quite a bit different as far as our usual themes, but people are going to enjoy it and have fun with it,” House says.

The exhibition will feature up to 100 different species from around the world, including butterflies from every continent, except for Antarctica. Guest favorites include blue morpho, heliconius, white kites and monarchs, to name a few. Visitors can expect to see 1,000 to 2,000 butterflies in the Butterfly Show on any given day.

In the on-site nursery, there are hundreds of chrysalises. Krohn Conservatory gets up to 16,000 of them from butterfly farmers from around the world for the Butterfly Show each year. Butterflies are chosen that do well in the environment as well as those that are popular with visitors.

Once a butterfly is ready to fly, they are carefully placed in a butterfly taxi, transported from the nursery into the showroom and released around 11 a.m. each day.

“The children can’t hide their emotions when they see these butterflies because they are large, floating around in the air, and there are so many of them. There are 1,000 or more every single day, and you can just see the smiles on their faces. They are so happy, and they’re watching them. I call the butterflies flying flowers because that’s what they look like,” House says. “Generations of people have experienced this, and they want their kids to see it. So, they keep coming back. That’s one of the reasons why it’s so popular, but it’s also something that’s very unusual. A Butterfly Show is not a common thing.”