Take Flight

Late last summer, Pat's mom Mary gave us a jar with a monarch butterfly caterpillar in it.  We watched it go through the life cycle and change into a butterfly.  It was such a neat experience I decided to try it from the very beginning. 

I got a neat pop-up butterfly keeper from Target this winter.  We went to my parents' farm area and found milkweed (which is a host plant for monarch butterfly eggs), and I plucked a few branches that looked like they had eggs on the bottom side of the leaf.  We put them in a jar of water in the butterfly keeper and waited.  After about a week we started to spot itty bitty caterpillars crawling around!  Since the eggs were so small, I wasn't sure how many there were.  There must have been five, because that's how many caterpillars there eventually were.  We continued caring for them by changing out the water and giving them fresh milkweed leaves.  Olivia was always there wanting to help transfer the caterpillars.  I was proud at how brave she was handling them. 

The little guys quickly grew.  Eventually they mounted themselves from the top of the cage and formed a chrysalis.  About 10 days after that they started to crack open and emerge as a butterfly.  When I was releasing one I witnessed another chrysalis crack, and watched as the butterfly came out!  I thought it was pretty cool to experience, but when I excitedly waved Pat to come watch too, he could have cared less.  City boy.

The best part was releasing them.  For three of them we needed to give them a little encouragement with pulling them out and placing them on a flower.  Two must have had enough time to dry their wings and were getting impatient because they flew right out. 

 It was a pretty neat experience, and one I'm excited to make an annual tradition.