Saturday September 1, 2007

Mossy

I remember when Mossy was a tiny egg – now look at her – she’s ready to turn into a chrysalis.

But, for some reason, she had trouble climbing up the aquarium side, and spent most of the evening crawling around the bottom of the tank.  Finally, I helped her crawl on a milkweed leaf so she could start over.

But, in the morning she was attached to a leaf – the first of my caterpillars to not be on the screen when they transformed into a chrysalis.

Inge had been reading my blog and was hoping something exciting would be happening in the aquarium when she came to my office for our monthly TFC Communications meeting on Thursday afternoon.

She missed the first butterfly (Michaela) by a few hours, but was excited to watch Mossy turn into a chrysalis.

Amazed is how I still feel each time I watch this process.

~~~

Remember I told you about the new caterpillar (Mason) that hitchhiked along on a leaf over the weekend when our daughter-in-law Kristen got fresh milkweed – while we were in East St Louis? 

On Wednesday evening when I walked to Jere and Kristen’s for Ian’s party, I checked out a new area where I thought I saw milkweed from the car.  It was milkweed – and there was another caterpillar about the same size as Mason, so I decided to bring Meadow home so they can be partners.

That means I have been foster mother to thirteen Monarch caterpillars!