Well, Uncle Jason, Aunt Becca, and cousin Dallin sent the TX Doolittle kids a Butterfly Garden for Christmas. Lillie and Samuel love anything Science-y and were super excited about it. It was also great because it was a Christmas gift we had to put away for awhile until the weather was warm enough for the butterflies to survive. When we pulled it out in March it was like Christmas all over again! We pulled out the larvae coupon and sent in our order. Five days later we received four beautiful and very tiny caterpillars.
We watched them grow in the cup and once they attached to the top of the lid and made their chrysalis we transferred then to the net enclosure. Then came the fun part.... We were so excited when we saw the first one hatching! However after a few hours it was clear that it was not going to emerge all the way. If you look closely you can see it on the top left of the paper sort of halfway out of it's chrysalis. Everyone was very sad about the little girl. What's interesting about her story though is that after all the butterflies had hatched about a week had past. We just left her alone assuming she was dead. But she started shaking around a lot. So I pulled her out of the net and pulled the rest of the cocoon off of her. It was the saddest thing. You could see that her wings hadn't formed all the way but it was amazing that after that long she was still alive! Lillie took her in as her special pet. She would put nectar in her hand then hold the butterfly and help her drink. It was sweet to see how tenderhearted Lillie was with her. It was a good lesson as well for them to see that things don't always work out in nature.
On a happier note the other 3 butterflies developed beautifully and the kids had a lot of fun with them. We let them stay in the net for 4 days. Each day the kids would gather new flowers from our yard for them and then sprinkle them with sugar water.
They also loved to reach in the net and let them fly onto their fingers.
They each got to let one of the go. They were initially sad but then thought it was pretty cool. Now anytime we see a painted lady butterfly in our yard the kids are certain that it is one of their butterflies. I of course encourage this.
Thank you so much MN Doolittles for the wonderful Christmas present!
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