Kindy Caterpillars

Zach's kindy has a bush that attracts the Monarch butterfly.  A few weeks ago the caterpillars started coming out and they were all over it!  Zach, Tilly and Lani had a great time find all sizes of caterpillars and letting them crawl onto their fingers.  And over the last few weeks we've kept an eye on them as they go through each phase of growing into butterflies.

This caterpillar we managed to keep an eye on all the way through to it becoming a butterfly.  They attach themselves and hang upside down while they make the chrysalis, which is made like a new skin, and the old one is shed to reveal the chrysalis underneath.  They stay in it for about 2 weeks (we kept checking on ours eagerly every time we went back to kindy!). It's bright green for most of that, but towards the end it begins to darken until you can start to see the wings through it.  Then on the day before they come out it goes almost black and you can see the wings really clearly as the chrysalis is really thin.  Then they work their way out, hang on to the outside while they pump up their wings and let them harden.  Then they flutter them a little and go for little test flights around the bush before trusting them properly.

A teeny one on Lani

...and on Zach...

...and Tilly :)

Our little caterpillar's (which turned out to be female) chrysalis was really dark when we dropped Zach at kindy last Thursday and then by the time we came to collect him she had just come out and was sitting on the bush letting her wings grow harder and stronger.  She had a close call when she took a test flight and ended up on the main path out of kindy.  We got a leaf for her to crawl onto and put her back in the bush out of the way of little trampling feet.

Pretty new and bright green

getting darker

Almost ready...

and she's out!