hungry

thirty one hungry mouths to feed. never had this many.

they are 2nd instars - less than a 1/4" long now. they will grow 3000 times their size before becoming a chrysalis.

14kt gold and jade

the monarch chrysalis is so beautiful. chrysalis is a greek word meaning golden crown.

here are a few reasons for the gold dots...

camouflage - they reflect colors of the surroundings and break up the shape of the chrysalis

warning  - somehow the coloration would fend off predators

protection - they filter particular wavelengths of light which might be harmful to the monarchs

nothing - no function, but just the result of something else in the cuticle

the more i read, it seems to be, that they are points of entry for air entering the chrysalis.

whatever the reason for them... they look like 14kt gold and jade to me... just a beautiful jewel.

transformed

the transformation from caterpillar to chrysalis is amazing.

the first change is the tentacles will start to shrivel up. the caterpillar is hanging in j position, pumping their body. their skin will start to shrivel up too. there is a green tinge to their body.

and then the skin splits.

it starts at the back of the head and moves up the caterpillars back. the caterpillar is twisting and turning, trying to release itself from it's old skin. it becomes more and more shriveled up as it wriggles free. it even sheds all its facial features.

the 4th picture down is the most fascinating to me. since it was attached to the silk pad with its back legs - and it won't have them soon - a little stick, called a cremaster - pokes out from inside it's body. the cremaster searches for the silk pad and attaches itself to the pad. after it has done this, it can then fully release all of it's old body parts. this is so important because if it does not attach to the pad properly, it would fall to the ground and die, since at this point, it is very delicate - it's a suspended bag of fluid. i had never seen this happen before - but i was looking for it this time... and sure enough - there it was. the cremaster.

he will then twist and turn until all of the old skin drops off, readjusting to it's new body form.

and then it starts... the end of life as a caterpillar, and the beginning of the third stage of life - the chrysalis.

this all happens in a few minutes.

emergence

i have been waiting to see this. the monarch butterfly emergence, or eclosion, from the chrysalis.

this morning i got to watch 3 of them emerge.

i did not get my camera in time to get him actually pushing out of the chrysalis - but got these pictures immediately after he slipped free.

when they first emerge from the chrysalis, their wings are tiny and wrinkled. their abdomen is swollen and full of liquid. they pump liquid from their abdomen into their wings.

a few minutes later the wings are fully expanded - but they are soft and vulnerable. they hang vertically for a few hours until their wings are hardened and this butterfly is ready to fly !

so far... i have 3 girls and 1 boy. i have 9 chrysalis left.

this is their fourth, and last, stage of life... the butterfly.

chrysalis

i ended up with 14 caterpillars this round. i have a few left hanging in 'j position' and the rest are already a chrysalis.

i had a terrible fatality - something i hadn't seen before - one of the caterpillars fell half way through becoming a chrysalis. i don't know why... maybe he did not attach himself securely. it was very sad.

so in a 10-14 days i will start releasing 13 beautiful monarch butterflies.

this is their third stage of life... the chrysalis, or pupa.