During Sharon's stay we went to the Niagara Falls Butterfly Conservatory.  The conservatory has over 2,000 colourful tropical butterflies flying around in lush, exotic gardens.   The conservatory is basically a rainforest setting containing 45 different species.  

I discovered that It is was not  easy taking pictures of butterflies.  The majority of them like to keep on the move.   I was handholding the camera inside the conservatory  so I had to use a fairly wide open aperture to let a lot of light in. This results in  a narrow depth of field so not that much of the photograph ends up being in focus.   The above  butterfly is called a Plain Tiger and its range is Malaysia, Africa and Australia.

This butterfly is called a Small Postman and lives in Mexico through Central America.  This butterfly is actually poisonous-who knew?   The caterpillars ingest and store toxins from its host plant and  are passed onto the adult.   

This butterfly is called Rice Paper/Large Tree Nymph and is from South East Asia.   These butterflies are also distasteful to predators as they assimilate the toxins from their hostplants,  Dogbane and Milkweed.  I really thought this was an interesting looking butterfly.

I thought this butterfly was really colourful but I'm not sure of its name.

A Blue Morpho.  The underside of the wings are a dull brown colour with numerous eye spots.  The eyespots serve as a defence mechanism against all sorts of predators like insects and birds.   You might be asking where the blue is?

Here you can see the blue metallic wings.  Apparently the brilliant blue is due to how the microscopic scales on he backs of their wings reflect light.

Sharon and I finally figured out that this beautiful blue butterfly was the same butterfly with the dull brown colour on the underside of its wings.

This butterfly is called an Owl and originates  in Mexico and South America.  What a perfect name!

The Julia  is from Southern United States and Neotropics.  

This butterfly is striped like a Zebra so it is no surprise that it is called a Zebra Longwing.  It is from Southern USA through Central America and South America.

This Tiger Longwing lives in the area of Mexico to the Peruvian Amazon.  It is very similar to a Plain Tiger butterfly.

This is a Clipper from  South East Asia.  This butterflies  come in a range of colour forms including green, blue, brown and yellow.  However, the abdomen is always striped and these butterflies have distinct white patches on the forewing.

The butterflies often landed on people.   This one is a Doris Longwing ranging from  Mexico to the Amazon Basin.   Now that you know everything that you want to  (and more)  about butterflies it is time to call it a day!