SPREAD YOUR WINGS. Butterfly Fest returns this August with guided tours, activities, and a new feature to attract butterflies right to your hands!

Beaver Creek Reserve’s popular annual event, Butterfly Fest, is just about ready to unfurl its wings and fly, bringing back favorite features and a new experience too! The Butterfly House is hyper-seasonal and is open seven days a week for visitors to make the most of its short season (July through Labor Day), with Butterfly Fest serving as its highlight event on Aug. 4.

The celebratory event brings Beaver Creek’s experts to the Butterfly House to offer guided tours, allowing folks to check out the summer Caterpillar Lab – usually not open to tours! – where they raise all their monarch caterpillars from egg to chrysalis; learn about the different butterfly species in Wisconsin; make interactive butterfly-themed crafts; and enjoy lemonade and custard from Culver’s.

New this year to Butterfly Fest, attendees will each get a butterfly feeder to walk throughout the House with, with the hopes of a butterfly landing on it right before your eyes. “This is a super unique experience to be able to offer visitors as we haven’t done this before, and it’s free,” said Kristen Giefer, Beaver Creek’s marketing and program director. “Inside the feeder is butterfly nectar, which should attract butterflies for an up-close look!”

Last year, the one-day event welcomed roughly 600 people, and this year promises to wow hundreds more.

While walk-ins at Butterfly Fest are welcome, advanced tickets are on sale through Friday, Aug. 2. Beaver Creek members will pay $8/adult and $5/youth (ages 2-15). Non-members will pay $10/adult and $7/youth (2-15). Kids under the age of two will get in for free.

Butterfly Fest 2024 is Sunday, Aug. 4, from 11am-3pm at Beaver Creek Reserve (S1 County Rd. K, Fall Creek) • the Butterfly House is open from July through Labor Day • Visit Beaver Creek Reserve’s website for more info