Monteverde Butterfly Gardens Tour
Description
Our tours are a little over an hour in length, and include the following: An introduction to Costa Rica bugs, and an orientation to the Gardens An up-close experience with a variety of insects and arachnids A look at our rearing chamber, where caterpillars are becoming butterflies A stroll through our 3 unique gardens, full of spectacular butterflies. The most valuable part of every admission to the Monteverde Butterfly Gardens is a tour with one of our dedicated and passionate guides. Available in English or Spanish our tours will take you through each section of the insectarium and gardens. With our guide at your side, you will see and learn far more than you ever would by yourself. Our guides love bugs! Our guide will provide lots of interesting information as the tour progresses. Once the tour is over, you are welcome to continue exploring on your own for as long as you'd like. Pay your entry once and keep coming back as long as you are in Monteverde!
Tour Options
Itinerary
Here at the Monteverde Butterfly Gardens, we have been teaching people about Costa Rica's insects and arachnids for over 30 years. We have made it our mission to change the way people think about these small, misunderstood creatures. This may seem like a daunting task, but our bugs and tour guides can win over even the most skeptical visitor! With up to 30 species of butterfly in 4 different habitats, over 20 species of live insects and arachnids in our nature center, an active leaf-cutter ant colony and the best guides in the business, we truly have something for everyone!
Highlights
What's included
Traveller Ratings
Important Information
- Infants and small children can ride in a pram or stroller
- Service animals allowed
- Public transportation options are available nearby
- Suitable for all physical fitness levels
- Children must be accompanied by an adult
Reviews(87)
This was a great way to spend a couple hours that we had free in the afternoon when we were in Monteverde. We had our 10 and 12 year olds with us, and all four of us were fascinated by all of the things we learned in the insect room with the tour guide, who was excellent. In fact, we came to see the butterflies, but we ended up finding the insect room to be the best part of the experience. Because we came late in the afternoon, the butterflies weren't very active, so if you want to see more of them flying around, you may want to visit in the morning. But no matter when you come, you will learn a lot about the interesting bugs of Costa Rica.
💚🪳🪲Thank you so much! I'm so happy to hear you guys enjoyed our awesome bugs!🐛🕷️💚
A nice exhibit of local insects and four greenhouses of butterflies of different types and environments. Informative and friendly guides. The final section of road is very steep so beware.
Thank you! 💚🪲💚
What a delightful time we spent at the gardens. The girl giving the fantastically informative and entertaining talk completely made it! Sadly I can’t remember her name, she is on sabbatical and only has three more weeks there. What a loss. The talk was very interesting and seeing all the butterflies was a delight. Sadly we had to leave Monteverde the next day, otherwise we would have been back.
Thank you! 💚🦋💚
Such a little gem in Monte Verde! Lots of butterflies in different spaces. Super friendly staff. Our guide knew a lot about the different varieties.
Thank you!! 💚🪲💚
I learnd a lot about the life of butterflys and other insects. Thanks to the profound knowledge and the good humuor of our guide, this tour was amazing and real fun.
Thank you Peter! We appreciate that you enjoyed our humor! 🤩🕷️💚
Good explanation and enough time to walk around and see everything. Because it was very rainy those days opportunity to admire butterflies.
Thank you!! 💚🪲💚
The guide explained a lot of very interesting little things, the different gardens... very nice and interesting and after the tour we could go back alone and take our time.
Merci Beaucoup 💚🦋
We had a fantastic tour of the butterfly gardens and the bugs! Our tour guide Leah was so enthusiastic and passionate and absolutely brilliant with so much knowledge! We learnt so much from her whilst she completes her internship. The butterflies, especially the Morphos were stunning, a very worthwhile tour if you are in Monteverde.
Thank you!! 💚🪲🦋
This was a wonderful learning experience! So many beautiful butterflies in various stages of metamorphosis. The Blue Morphis is absolutely stunning. The Owl Butterfly has such amazing artistry on the outside of its wings to protect itself from would-be predators, including what looks like a snake. So cool!
Thank you 💚🕷️💚
We visit Costa Rica regularly and have always loved the butterfly and sloth garden at Selvatura. This time, we tried a different garden with a larger group, and it was a big letdown. The enclosures were basic—just sticks and cloth—and there were very few butterflies. Our guide, a kind volunteer, told us he was promised food and housing for an internship but ended up in a shed eating beans and rice every day. Overall, poorly managed and not worth the visit. We’ll be recommending other places or going back to Selvatura next time.
Jacob, What a Lovely photo from march 2024 I would like to take the opportunity to correct a couple of the things that are said here. As the longest running butterfly garden in Central America, we are confident that we're doing things right. Our mission is sharing how cool bugs are with people from all around the world. We have three different green houses, each built from different materials to mimic the natural habitats of the butterfly species we care for. Unfortunately our habitats are not made of sticks and cloth that would be a lot cheaper to maintain! Speaking of maintenance, our maintenance crew works really hard to keep the plants healthy and the greenhouses intact in order to meet the needs of the butterflies and keeping things looking nice for guests. We are one of the very last volunteer programs that do not make people pay to volunteer. Our science communication interns, are provided housing and food during their 10 weeks with us. As someone who has been to Costa Rica several times, I'm sure that you know, rice and beans are the corner stone of a Costa Rican diet! Everything about our internship is laid out in great detail in a PDF on the volunteer page on our website. I'm not sure what Jacob's motivations are but I hope that you will read all of the other reviews celebrating the hard work that our team does to help our world's unloved creatures.
