butterflitic retrospect:
so i think this piece was inspired by the butterfly habitat i ordered for one of the many birthday parties z was invited to back in may. i never imagined having to come up with 6 gifts for 5 yr olds - but thankfully, amazon.com came through and i ended up ordering a plethora of paper airplane kits and 1 butterfly habitat - which we kept. what a cool gift and not just for kids, i think cj and i have been more interested in it than the kids. anyway....a long story short, you order the habitat when you recieve it you send away for the caterpillars which come in a little jar and for the next week or so, you watch 5 little minis voraciously feed on the mysto-waxy food that lines the bottom of the jar. just like "the very hungry caterpillar" story by eric carle, the caterpillars quadruple in size in just like 5 days - it's crazy! cool, but crazy (this is why it's perfect for a child's 5 minute attn span). anyway, so after a week or so, they build their chrysalis' and hang from the lid of the jar for like another week or 10 days. you remove the lid and pin it and it's hanging bundles to the habitat wall and wait.....
unfortunately, our first batch died mysteriously...they all grew and then when it came time to build their coccoons, only one succeeded, but he fell off the lid and died, i guess. so to avoid difficult questions and unnerving disappointment, we ordered some more caterpillars and these were successful and are now sitting in their butterfly habitat, eating sugar-water on lisianthus flowers as we wait for the outside temps to exceeed 65 degrees (though it only needs to be 55, it's been dropping below that at night - so we're playing it safe). the butterflies are painted ladies and they are beautiful. they are quite friendly too and i much enjoy feeding them and letting them crawl on my arms as i do so....
what i didn't know about caterpillars as they're feeding and preparing for the next phase, they spin webs all around themselves and seem to use the webs to climb. they also are pretty comfortable with climbing on each other.
what i didn't know about caterpillars as they're feeding and preparing for the next phase, they spin webs all around themselves and seem to use the webs to climb. they also are pretty comfortable with climbing on each other.
the inside of the jar becomes pretty webby and sort of messy as they molt and do what normal living things do when they eat a bunch of food, though it's difficult to differentiate food from other stuff as the food gets granulated. 
the sides of the jar and the lid become covered with webs and once they molt into a butterfly are left with a piece of tissues paper and 5 empty coccoons, covered in webs....
here's a link to the store: http://www.insectlore.com/
