Over the last week and a half, we have had the privilege of watching God’s hand at work in one of his most awesome (in my opinion :D) creations – a caterpillar.
– and since then he (we’re not really sure it’s a he, but that was what we defaulted to – perhaps I should say “it”?), has grown to about 2 inches in length!
When I last posted, he was eating up a storm (about 2 good-sized milkweed leaves a day) and was up to just over an inch in length.
Since then, he has grown another inch, is pooping bits about the size of 1/3 of a rabbit pellet (I know! Insane!) and has molted another couple of times.
He went up to the top of the jar and started to “spin” a silk sort of web netting, to which in the middle he attached a silk “button”. I knew what was coming next! Hello Monarch Caterpillar chrysalis!
Sure enough, he attached himself upside down to the button and went into the tell-tale “J” shape. We were so excited! I did some research and found that they typically stay that way for about a day, but I was worried he would pupate overnight and we’d miss the whole process.
Not to fear – when I woke up in the morning he was still hanging. So I kept an eye on him for a bit to see make sure I wouldn’t miss any movements, but since he didn’t really seem to be doing anything, I headed up stairs to get the kids up.
15 minutes later, I came down to this:
I could not believe my eyes! I had woken up 3 or 4 times in the middle of the night to check on him, see how things were going, hoping to catch the pupating process on film, and I walk away for 10 minutes and BAM!
I was shocked. Oh well, missed the boat on that one! It is still absolutely amazing how God created them to have such incredible instincts!
We’ll keep you posted over the next week or two as to the progress of the chrysalis, and then….butterfly! Stay tuned!
