I have only been able to locate about four of the sixteen caterpillars I counted a few days ago one in the form of the chrysalis in the image above. I do not know what has become of them all.
The mote ideal is not entirely successful as one caterpillar went missing and one went into the water and drowned. I think I need a small screened enclosure to contain the caterpillars long enough to have them transform.
Today I constructed a box with a mote and added three milkweed plants. In order to easily find the chrysalises it is best to keep the caterpillars contained in a small area.
I plucked the largest caterpillars off the original milkweed plants and place them on the plants surrounded by the mote.
Yesterday the surprise chrysalis I mentioned in the previous post split and a shiny new male monarch emerged! You can tell the gender by looking for two dark spots on the lower half of the wings.
You can clearly see the two black markings just to the left and right of the abdomen in the image below.
I took inventory of the caterpillars on all the plants and my final tally was sixteen! Quite a good little crop and I am hoping for more visits from egg laying females when the sun come back out!
There are more than a few ways to identify a Milkweed plant playing host to Monarch caterpillars. Finding lovely little green bundles of digested milkweed is a sure sign caterpillars are at work!
I am jumping the gun a little with these next images but I just could not resist. This morning I went out to check the five milkweed plants I bought at wal-mart yesterday evening and to my surprise and delight found that there was a chrysalis that rode along on one of the leaves. The chrysalis is well advanced and very soon a brand new butterfly will emerge.
A newly developed Chrysalis looks like an exquisitely decorated piece of Jade. When a chrysalis becomes transparent like the one above the transformation is almost complete!
Today it has been about three weeks since I picked up four Milkweed plants (Asclepias) from Wal-mart. The Butterflies have carefully placed their eggs on the leaves and blossoms of all four plants and there are now over 10 caterpillars of varying sizes feeding and growing.
It will not be long before I can put my secret monarch plan into action. Stay informed by checking the site often.
It has been a few years since I took the time to commune with the Monarch Butterfly but here I go again. If you want to join me just head to Wal-Mart or Home Depot and purchase some milkweed in the garden center God will handle the rest.
To keep up with my progress use the label Monarch Butterfly at the bottom of each post concerning said insect.
I have started with four plants and butterflies have already deposited eggs on all four. The eggs have since hatched and in weeks I expect developing chrysalises.
