Haynesville Celebration of Butterflies
September 21, 2019

After attending a butterfly festival at Mt. Magazine, Arkansas in August of 1998, Master Gardener, Loice Lacy decided that Louisiana needed such an event.  While the state is known for numerous colorful festivals, it did not have one celebrating butterflies.

When Loice outlined her festival dream to Haynesville city officials, they were most cooperative, granting permission to stage the event at the Claiborne Parish Fairgrounds.  They agreed to till up the grass lawn in the front yard of an old dogtrot house that is on the fairgrounds so that plants attractive to butterflies could be planted there.  That year, ten trees were also put out that host the caterpillars of many species of butterflies.

With established  gardens and trees offering food for caterpillars and nectar for the butterflies, Haynesville was ready for the first annual Haynesville Celebration of Butterflies in September of 1999.  A butterfly conservatory was rented that year, but the second year a butterfly garden was planted inside the fairgrounds and a netted enclosure was erected over it at festival time.

In the third year of the festival, a writer for a newspaper in New Orleans referred to the festival as "a classroom for learning about nature."  That is what it is intended to be:  a family-oriented event with a slate of well-known speakers whose presentations cover not only butterflies, but many of the other beauties of nature.

Master Gardeners volunteer each year to help with the festival which takes place in the middle of September.  

​This year's date is September 21, 2019.  To see a brochure with a schedule and topics, please click HERE.

Monarchs during the 2013 Festival