monarch, gulf fritillary , and anise swallowtail are daily visitors. The swallowtail likes to hang out in our greenhouse and everybody loves the zinnias
Tag: #butterfly
Monarch butterfly number four is off!
Our adventure of keeping the caterpillars alive is at an end and we can let our milkweed plant grow up in peace. Next year hopefully we’ll have some butterflies laying their eggs on them and we’ll have some outdoor caterpillar adventures but for now this comes to an end of our monarch butterfly cultivation…
It’s a girl! Third monarch butterfly emerges
(I think)… The third monarch butterfly has emerged from its chrysalis and is getting ready to take off! The fourth one is still in a chrysalis (Not sure what’s the difference between a chrysalis and a pupa) and sadly the fifth monarch caterpillar died. But it’s always a wonderful feeling to see a brand new butterfly !
Second monarch butterfly emerges from its chrysalis!
Here is the whole saga of my second monarch butterfly coming out of his chrysalis and getting ready to take to the skies.
I brought it outside and had lunch with him (I identified the sex by looking for the spots on his wings) and did a bunch of photos and videos next to the garden where they would be plenty of flowers and lots of sun.
But it was windy and he was having trouble hanging on so I tried a few different approaches until finally settled on putting him inside a plastic storage tub and then putting that in the greenhouse. After a few hours of not much movement he suddenly moved his head back and forth and then just flew away! There will be more monarch butterfly content as I still have three caterpillars on the milkweed in my breakfast nook, plus I have lots of photos and video footage to go through.
Note: as fascinating as it is, please don’t try to raise monarch butterflies yourself; it can encourage the spread of a deadly parasite that has been ravaging them Monarchs’ population lately… I’m only doing it because there were eggs on my milkweed seedlings and I only want to make sure the caterpillars grow up successfully.
Monarch butterfly hatched when I wasn’t looking!
But I managed to carry it outside and it was able to get its wings working and fly…. I still have one chrysalis left to open and today discovered three new caterpillars!