Victoria Butterfly Gardens

Fabulous place to explore the life cycle of butterflies. Lots of other kewl things like flamingos and turtles, You can also just chill and read a book on the benches that are throughout the gardens. Great gift shop. Always new and wonderful things to see and do.
As a local, I visit this place often — season pass well worth it!

I never thought I’d give 5 stars to a butterfly gardens review. Hey… I’m not knocking it!.. just saying that I’m no butterfly lepidopterist. But here is why this spot is perfect: It’s small and intimate. In my opinion the best thing they’ve got going here is the smallness and diversity of ecology.
The size is truly modest. When you open the door you’ll think that you’ll walk out in 15 minutes it’s so small. But, alas, that’s the key. Out of nowhere and everywhere you really get to see butterflies up close and personal. Flying everywhere and landing on your camera lens like it aint’ no thang. Next thing you know you are looking at every nook and cranny completely mesmerized. These butterflies are so bright and flighty. And oh my gosh. the colors are so vibrant!
It’s all vibrant actually. The rainforest ecology system they’ve created is well-​done. Lush greenery. Musical water flows. Bold floral arrangements. And the colorful birds! Very cool to see up close. Someone say pink flamingo? How about fishes? Tortoises?
We really enjoyed our visit, actually, and spent about an hour snapping a overboard amount of pictures. Just in time, because a busload of tourists arrived just after we left. That sucks. I’d try to plan your visit during a quieter time. You won’t want to share this space with 50 other people.

I love this place!
+
First time here and impressed.
Hot inside so leave jackets in the car.
They provide a warmer for your camera because it is steamy.
Free parking
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It costs $ 16.00 for adults and no student rates.
(Bloedel conservatory is only $ 6.25!)

Got a Groupon deal for half off admissions — thoroughly enjoyed it! It’s a small garden but we spent about an hour in here just taking pictures of butterflies up close. It’s right near the Butchart Gardens so you can go to both. I love that you can just walk around and see butterflies fly around and do their thang.

Butterfly Gardens is just a few mins drive from Butchart Gardens. It basically is a tropical area indoors; very similar to the tropical part of the Vancouver Aquarium if you have ever been to. It is a new experience for me to see lots of butterlies flapping around and you can really get up close to them and take some nice pictures. Sometimes they will even land on you if you are sweet enough and that is an experience money can’t buy! They also have turtles, flamingos, parrots, gigantic moths etc to see. I wish it was bigger and more to see for 15 $ admission, but overall it is an interesting experience and I did have a good time there.

A lot of fun. Got kissed by a cute green parrot named Little E. Who apparently flirts with all the girls. The assistant care taker was super helpful and super sweet. The place itself is small, but there is a lot packed in it. I’d say the most upsetting thing is the iguana was hard to see.
So if you ever have questions or need help ask for Justin, of the guy in the hat.

Gorgeous butterfly garden, many birds, including flamingos, macaws, etc. They have wonderful waterfall, koi ponds. Great for the entire family. The only complaint I have was the identification pages were not given out because the printer was being slow, maybe they should laminate them. Easily done in one hour, defiantly not an all day outing. Otherwise a very nice experience.

I really had a blast here. Yeah, captive animals and stuff, but this was amazing and beautiful and informative and I am much much more interested in the notion of butterfly conservation than I ever would have been otherwise.
The butterflies were gorgeous and there were dozens of species. They were quite active, constantly around us or stopping to draw nectar from the thousands of gorgeous flowers inside the habitat. The free guide pamphlet and the occasional placards posted in the habitat helped us identify most of the species we saw.
I was most impressed by the large butterfly called the blue morpho… the blue sides of its wings were gorgeous, and the underwings were a fantastic contrast of brown with prominent eyespots. It seemed like all of the other butterflies were chasing the blue morphos, though… wonder what that’s about… jealousy I suppose.
Also there was the mind-​blowing giant owl butterfly, the tips of whose wings are camouflaged to LOOK LIKE THE FACE OF A FREAKING SNAKE! See the pictures below. How cool is that: nature, red in tooth and claw, promotes evolution of the likeness of your predator’s predator on your wing. Fantastic.
Other cool stuff included the aforementioned flowers and other plants, and several tropical birds, frogs, fish, an iguana, and turtles & tortoises. Also some helpful info on butterfly and moth life histories.
This is worth the stop and extra $ if you’re going to Butchart Gardens. It took us just over an hour. It was warm and humid inside, if that’s a concern, but not overpoweringly so.

Awesome place to visit if you’re into butterflies. tons of them flying around you and even landing on your head arms back etc. the only drawback is that regular price admission is about $ 15.00 for adults. It isn’t an overly large place so you could do this fairly quickly. we only stayed for an hour but we were stretching it. the best thing to do is try to look for coupons or Groupons so that it makes it cheaper for your visit

My husband and I decided to take our 2 year old here since he likes butterflies. I’ve been to Victoria a couple times before and never thought to drop by. Thanks to previous reviews we dressed in layered clothing as it was quite humid. I was pleasantly surprised by this gem of a place. My son was entertained by the resident iguana, parrot, turtles, flamingos and of course the thousands of butterflies. I had low expectations of this place and so I was delighted to see my 2 year old face light up. I would definitely visit here again. It’s worth a visit!

We didn’t expect such a variety of creatures in the butterfly garden. To our surprise there were parrots, flamingos, atlas moth caterpillars, geckos and more. They have a great picture pamphlet with the various fluttering and crawling creatures labeled. There also many garden interpreters available to explain that you see and engage with customers by bringing the enormous caterpillars out on their hands or showing off the pet parrot.
It’s a great place to take pictures, but watch out above you because there are many cocoons and caterpillars hanging from trees. It’s also very humid, so take care of your camera lenses.

We came here as part of an excursion that we purchased off the cruise ship. The butterfly garden was beautiful. There were so many varieties of butterflies and the front desk has brochures listing the names of each butterfly (if you were interested in knowing the names). In addition to butterflies, the gardens have little dart frogs, parrots, flamingos, and huge caterpillars.
Unfortunately, the gift shop left a lot to be desired… I wanted to purchase something but nothing interested me at the shop.

Though not as large as we had expected, this was a nice place to stop by and check out before going to Butchart Gardens nearby. Great for people of any age but definitely for kids because of all the educational facts displayed on signs throughout the area inside. There were turtles, flamingos, frogs, koi fish, baby birds, parrots, and obviously beautiful butterflies flying around.
We spent a good 1 – 2 hours here. The only disappointment was that even though this place was advertised in a magazine as «over 3000 butterflies flit about», the reality was it was more like ~20 butterflies flying around, and the rest were were mostly chrysalis/​cocoons.

This and the Royal B.C. Museum are my ideas of best value for the experience. Until you’ve felt the gentle flutter of a butterfly landing on your shoulder you haven’t experienced Victoria. The flamingos ate beautiful, the lush foliage is stunning and the finches, parrots and other birds are friendly and unafraid of the human guests. You can happily lose hours in this tiny jungle.

One of my favorite stops in Victoria! A path winds through one big jungle room lined with tropical fruit plants, trees hanging with chrysalises and hungry caterpillars. There are a couple parrots and small quail-​type birds wandering around that are very friendly. The butterflies, of course, were the main attraction. So beautiful!

Small yet very fun place to visit, especially for the kids. Now this place got my 12 yr old son to stop playing with his iPod and actually look around. Everywhere you look, there are butterflies. Big, small, bright colored, and some crazy huge moths! They will land on you, buzz right by you, and settle on the ground in front of you, so keep your eyes open!
It’s not a large place, but there is plenty to look at. They have a display of neon-​colored poisonous frogs (so dang cute!), flamingos, parrots, other birds roaming here and there, and turtles and tortoises. We easily spent an hour here, and got some fun photos too.

Wonderful attraction in Victoria, BC. I loved to see the butterflies. There was a nice variety. The place is clean and nice. The combination of this attraction with Butchart Gardens is really wonderful and amazing. There’s nothing else like it, not even in the United States.

We stayed for more than an hour and it was definitely worth the cost if you have interest in butterflies and now they are in a natural environment.
There were many beautiful flowers and butterflies. I was surpised to see tortoises there. Flamingos and small birds which looked like small hens. If you want to not keep asking yourself, «What is that?» I would recommend getting the guide they offer for purchase. It also is a fun little souvenir.
I would have loved to stay longer, but we had a ferry to catch.

Because my sister and I were waiting to see if the weather improved before heading to the Butchart Gardens, we stopped in here.
This place is extremely warm and humid to keep the butterflies happy, this did not make my hair happy and I wound up looking like a teased poodle by the time we left.
That being said, seeing all the pretty butterflies was really worth it. I kept trying to get a picture of the Blue Morpho, but it evaded me time after time. The water features were very cool, I loved the pink flamingos that hung out in the little lake.
I was able to get some great shots of the flowers, and even a few of the butterflies that decided to stay still enough for me. Was worth the cost of admission. We really don’t see that many wild butterflies anymore, and that is such a shame.. . where have they all gone?

This was one of the interesting places to visit on my visit to Vancouver Island. It’s a large climate controlled environment with tons of butterflies, some parrots, flamingos, turtles, and other wildlife.
It was weird seeing butterflies everywhere, some so bold to land on people. Having gone to a lot of zoos, I don’t know if this is really well maintained as other places I’ve been to. They don’t necessarily have as many animals under one enclosure, but maybe for the welfare of the animals, that might not be a bad thing.