Foster Care for Caterpillars

We always have something going on. Now, what started in Mary Alice bringing in one tiny caterpillar egg on a Milkweed leaf, has grown into something of a manufacturing process of monarch caterpillars. George, and all of his tiny cousins, 61 of them in all--- yes, I said 61!!! are happily engaged in various stages of metamorphosis in on our dining room table. Matthew collected them all from the milkweed in our yard. Above is a picture of the project. Each leaf has between 1-8 tiny little eggs on it. Below gives you an idea of how tiny an egg is.....

This guy just hatched.

These photos were taken by Eric and Matthew through a special microscope/camera/computer program.

Aren't they amazing??

This is an egg getting ready to hatch.

Almost there. This happens in a matter of minutes.

Eating its way out of the eggshell.

Coming out, head first.

Turning around, eating the eggshell.

Starting to eat the leaves.

Relative size of  George, after a few days.

The habitat that Eric, Matthew and Mary Alice designed and built for the caterpillars to live in while they are eating and growing. All they eat are milkweed leaves, so they have to have fresh every few days.

So far, only George is in the habitat. The others are too small yet, or not hatched.

After they are done eating and have grown much bigger, they will climb to the top and hang in their chrysalis, for two weeks and then come out as beautiful butterflies!!

What fun!

The above Photo from The Butterfly Site

All others are ours.