Nature : Butterflies Are Free Therapy at Sanctuary : Colorful Insects Help Residents of a Pennsylvania Veterans Home Relax and Gain Confidence

When 78-year-old Kathryn Bragonier needs a sedative, she doesn’t reach for a pill.

She ducks into a butterfly sanctuary at the 199-acre Hollidaysburg Veterans Home in Hollidaysburg, Pa., where she lives. Within minutes, she is more relaxed.

“There’s nothing else that makes me calm down,” Bragonier said.

She is among many at the 500-resident Blair County home who seek solace and activity in the sanctuary. Residents tend the insects and two butterfly gardens.

One year ago, retired Penn State professor Robert Snetsinger filled the former administration building’s personnel office and courtyard with butterflies. He visits the sanctuary each Wednesday, bringing caterpillars and plants.

The walls are covered with paintings of butterflies, and occasionally one of the colorful insects flutters through the room. Butterflies are preserved in display boxes.

A larger, more butterfly-friendly facility will be built this fall. The state Department of Military Affairs will spend $80,000 for a butterfly greenhouse that could fill one-third of a football field.

“Sometimes, the people here don’t have a lot of family,” said Bob Ruggery, a pest control specialist for the home. “This will bring people to the home. The residents will help explain the butterflies. They’ll interact.”

Snetsinger, who has a doctorate in insect study, thought a butterfly sanctuary would provide a place for peace, amazement and activity. He and his youngest daughter, who died nine years ago, shared a love for butterflies. After her death, he found comfort in watching caterpillars change into butterflies.

As things turned out, he isn’t the only one who can appreciate how butterflies can enrich humans, the way other animals do in pet-therapy situations.

Jim Maley, 52, lagged in the background on field trips for home residents. But contact with the butterflies piqued his interest.

“Around the butterflies, he got confidence,” Snetsinger said. “It was, ‘Oh, that’s a floral crescent.’ And he became a leader.”

Maley said that when the caterpillars become butterflies, they are released.

“Butterflies are free,” he said. “We let them go in the end.”