Elizabeth's Secret Garden

On the third day the Queen caterpillar shed its skin for the first time. In just one day the caterpillar tripled in size! You can see the big chew marks on the leaf. Above are pictures of a Queen and Monarch caterpillar. They both eat milkweed. Monarch caterpillars have two sets of antennae and Queen caterpillars have three sets. Another difference is the stripe pattern.   Monarchs and Queen caterpillars only eat milkweed. If you have extra space in your garden please plant some.

This is a close up view of a Monarch butterfly’s egg. These little eggs are impossible to find if you drop them by mistake. That is why butterflies secrete a glue-like chemical that secures the egg to the milkweed leaf. Even is you spray the leaf with the hose the eggs will still stay attached. If you wait 24 hours for the egg to harden you can remove it from the leave by rubbing it with your finger.   Usually Monarchs and Queens will lay only one egg per leaf, but I had a monarch butterfly that went crazy with egg laying. It laid hundreds of eggs on my almost bare milkweeds! There must not be many milkweeds around where we live. Thankfully now that it is summer my milkweed are growing very big. Usually it takes 3 to 5 days for Queen and Monarch eggs to hatch. While inside the egg the larvae is developing and is nourished by a yolk inside the egg. Hours before it emerges you will begin to notice that the very tip of the egg is turning black. This black spot is its h...

“Detective Joshua” decided to take on a new disguise. He is dressed in his monarch caterpillar apparel. On his head he is wearing one of my fuzzy hats. Today he is searching for monarch caterpillars. While outside a new butterfly flew to my garden, a queen butterfly! Like monarchs they also lay eggs on milkweeds. Queen butterflies are a darker color and have more white spots on their wings. Even though these to butterflies look very similar their caterpillars look completely different. After a lot of waiting I finally got a picture of a queen butterfly laying eggs on my milkweed. Look how it curls its abdomen to lay a tiny egg. Here is one egg the queen butterfly laid. It is so amazing how this tiny egg can grow to be a beautiful butterfly. I believe only an all powerful God could of created such a beautiful creation. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1 Technorati Tags: Queen butterfly , Queen butterfly laying egg

We decided to name our mystery caterpillar, “Mannly the Wooly Mammoth”. We named it, Mannly, because our last name is Mann. It is a silly name but it just seems to fit. I hope its not a girl caterpillar! Our neighbors have tons of dandelions growing in their backyard. They let me pick some to feed my caterpillar. As you can see, “Mannly the Mammoth” caterpillar has been enjoying eating them. Look how big he is now! My sister can actually hear it munching on the dandelions. Mannly the Wooly Mammoth surprised “Detective Joshua”! Given these clues, can you help “Detective Joshua” determine what kind of caterpillar it is?

My mom found this caterpillar crawling along the road. Look at how big it is compared to the size of my mom’s hand! I have been trying to figure out what kind of caterpillar it is and I think it might be a salt marsh caterpillar. This will be my very first moth to raise. I put some Maple tree leaves and a dandelion inside to see which one it would eat. It went straight for the dandelion and is feasting on it. The one I put inside had a purple flower. These caterpillars are great to have because they eat weeds and are a pleasure to watch. So many people pull out every weed they find hiding in their yard. Next time you are tempted to get out your weed killing spray consider who’s lunch you might be snatching. Some “weeds” serve as food for beautiful butterflies and some moths.

Did you guess what color chrysalis this black swallowtail would make? Caterpillar 3 made a brown chrysalis. In the picture beside it is a caterpillar that made a green chrysalis right on its host plant stem. What great camouflage! If you look closely the chrysalis looks like an animal. My best friend said it looks like a bat. My last caterpillar climbed to the top of my butterfly pavilion to make a chrysalis. It is brown just like caterpillar four’s chrysalis. 

  The Black Swallowtail is a beautiful butterfly that is a frequent visitor to gardens especially if you are growing the herbs parsley, dill, or fennel. They have gregarious caterpillars that can munch down a parsley plant before you get the chance harvest it, but the way I see it is that by sacrificing parsley, you are helping nature. The rule of thump is to plant a lot! I went to a plant stand and bought two pots of parsley, but I was able to multiply those plants into 8 because there were 4 plants in each pot. That is a tip for plant buying. Sometimes there are more than one plant in a pot and you can just divide it to make more. At 11 days old, my first Black Swallowtail caterpillar was ready to make its chrysalis. They can crawl several feet from the plant in search of a place to pupate. I had four caterpillars that I raised inside my pavilion. One caterpillar lived half of its life out in my garden box. They are more susceptible to predators and disease if left outside ...