| Duration: | 1 Day(s) - 0 Night(s) |
| Tour Category: | Family Tours |
The Monteverde Butterfly Garden, or Mariposario, is one of the area's original and most visited attractions. Situated in Cerro Plano, between the town of Santa Elena and the Monteverde Reserve, the Mariposario offers a biodiversity center, medicinal plant garden, live leafcutter ant colony, in addition to four climate-controlled butterfly gardens where visitors can observe some of the most beautiful and fascinating insects in the Tropics.
Explore More About Monteverde Butterfly Garden:
At Monteverde Butterfly Garden you can find roughly 35 butterfly species in four different climate-controlled habitats, a leafcutter ant colony, a medicinal plant garden, and a nature center with over 20 species of live Costa Rican insects and arachnids. This tour is ideal for all ages and allows you to observe these tropical creatures while your guide teaches you about the different species and their habitats.
The garden was founded in 1989 by biologist Jim Wolfe and his wife Marta with the goal of educating visitors about Costa Rica’s native insect and butterfly populations. Jim and Marta have been hand-raising butterflies and other insects for the past sixteen years, and have a wealth of knowledge about these fragile creatures. Unlike other gardens that buy their chrysalides, all of the butterflies in the garden are bred on the premises.
The Monteverde Butterfly Garden believes in hands-on education. The biodiversity center displays insects and arachnids that are local to Monteverde, many of which are still alive. This allows visitors to have an up-close and personal experience with the creatures as they learn about their breeding and feeding habits. There is a live bug cam, as well as a case for viewing the butterflies as they emerge from their chrysalides.
Each of the four butterfly gardens represents a different Costa Rican habitat. They vary according to temperature, altitude, and vegetation, ranging from hot lowlands to high-altitude cloud forests. The gardens contain more than fifty species in total, including the Calico (the only butterfly in the world to produce sound), Blue Morpho, Glass-Wings, and Zebra-Wing butterfly.
The medicinal plant garden is a self-guided tour of more than seventy plants that are used medicinally throughout the world. An information sheet lists their many – and often surprising – uses.
The final, and perhaps most fascinating, the exhibit is the leafcutter ant colony. The ant colony is displayed under glass, which allows visitors to see the ants carrying leaves along with a network of trails to their nest. They do this to cultivate a fungus from the decomposing vegetation that they will later use for food.
