Category: Learning New Things!

My Butterfly is still living!  Hooray!  I am happy.  She is almost a month old! I am feeding her and trying not to touch her wings much. She likes to find a place in the sun and sun bathe. When it gets cool at night, she stays so still, she looks like she died.Since she likes climbing to the top of her cage, we put it sideways so she has netting all around and can climb.

She would be already dead by now if she lived in the wild. I like taking care of her. I am having fun with her even though I can mostly just look at her.

I have released three butterflies, two of them on Wednesday. Here are pictures of me playing with them.

I have a pet butterfly that is on hospice. She is the one that fell when emerging. Her wings are starting to tear apart and she lost part of her leg. We have her in a small cage that is sideways so she can climb the netting sides.  She likes to try to fly, but loves to eat! Mom said she will be the fattest butterfly we know, but she will die happy.  Mark says she will die very happily!

A butterfly just emerged! We were gone for about an hour and it emerged and its wings are straight already. We will release it in a few hours.

I have one chrysalises still. It is still green, but looking a little wrong.

Here is our running total:

Caterpillars collected this year: 70

Total Emerged Butterflies: 57

On Saturday, I lost my first front top tooth. Today, I lost the second. Mark says that I sound funny. Now I can sing,

All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth
By: Donald Yetter Gardner in 1944

Every body Pauses and stares at me
These two teeth are gone as you can see
I don’t know just who to blame for this catastrophe!
But my one wish on Christmas Eve is as plain as it can be!

All I want for Christmas
is my two front teeth,
my two front teeth,
see my two front teeth!

Gee, if I could only
have my two front teeth,
then I could wish you
“Merry Christmas.”
It seems so long since I could say,
“Sister Susie sitting on a thistle!”
Gosh oh gee, how happy I’d be,
if I could only whistle (thhhh, thhhh)

All I want for Christmas
is my two front teeth,
my two front teeth,
see my two front teeth.

Gee, if I could only
have my two front teeth,
then I could wish you
“Merry Christmas!”

We had something new happen to our butterflies. One fell while emerging. When Momma came up to check on them, she saw her and put her back on her chrysalis. Her wings were still wet. She looked way different from the other ones. She finished plumping out her wings, but she is still deformed. See the picture of her on the right. We are going to keep her until she dies ’cause she can’t fly outside. She can fly inside like a flutter.

We also had two butterflies die in one night and we don’t have any idea why.  Mark wonders if they would have survived in the wild. I don’t think they would have made it to Mexico.

Caterpillars collected this year: 70

Total Emerged Butterflies: 53

Running total:

Lost: 11, two after forming chrysalis, four butterfly just before emerging, five caterpillars and two moldy eggs.

Butterflies Released: 50

Butterflies Pinned: 2, not sure why, but two died in the big cage.  So Daddy taught us how to pin them.

Deformed Butterflies: 1

Soon to be Released: 0

Chrysalises: 6

Caterpillars: 0

Eggs: 0



I have four new butterflies! They are two boys and two girls! We released 6 butterflies yesterday.

I also have 15 chrysalises, one piggy caterpillar and 7 smaller caterpillars.

Spraying them with water seems to be helping as long as we don’t overwater them.

Total butterflies this year–45 released plus 4 soon to be released.

Today, Daddy and I went to do the trash and then got some milkweed.

Momma helped me feed the caterpillars.  We moved a lot to the aquarium.

I had to bury two dead ones today. One medium caterpillar who was sick a few days (Momma had put in quarantine) and one newly formed chrysalis.

Running Total:

Lost: 9, one after forming chrysalis, three butterfly just before emerging, four caterpillars and two moldy eggs.

Butterflies Released: 39

Soon to be Released: 0

Chrysalises: 6

Roaming Caterpillars: 3

Caterpillars in large cage almost ready to roam: 6

Eggs: 4

I have some exciting news! Three of our butterflies hatched! There are two boys and one girl.

We have one chrysalis that we don’t know if the butterfly is okay. If he does not emerge tomorrow, we will still clean the cage really well. We lost one small caterpillar while molting.

We have three new chrysalises  today. We had a sneaky caterpillar. Momma did not know to move one of the caterpillars and I was looking at the caterpillars and thought the one was dead. It was in its “J” under a leaf in a small container.

So, our totals are

Lost: 7, three butterfly just before emerging, three caterpillars and two moldy eggs.

Butterflies Released: 35

Soon to be Released: 1 girl and 2 boys

Caterpillar Stages: Momma refuses to count them all!

We are not sure what is happening, but our butterflies are dying in their chrysalises.  We have lost three butterflies so far. Momma did some research and we are spritzing them with water. Daddy thinks that they may be drying out even though it is so humid.

We cleaned the aquarium out and will not put any new caterpillars in it until all the butterflies hatch (or die 🙁 ) and we clean it good with bleach. So the largest caterpillars are in the butterfly cage for now.

Today one egg hatched and we found a medium size caterpillar while getting food for all the caterpillars.

We have been learning a lot about butterflies! Today we cleaned and feed all our pets.

The other day we saw something we have never seen before! We saw when they molt! They shed their skin by pushing it off. It was cool. Here is a picture of it!

One of our butterflies, I named him Clandor, his wing– a big part of the tip–was falling off. We thought to release him because it was easier for him to live outside. He could fly almost as well as the others. We don’t know what happened to his wing. We forgot to get a picture of him.

Uncle Josh and Auntie Angie helped us release four butterflies on Monday.

We have two new butterfly girls; one emerged yesterday and one today.

Tuesday night we had one that looked like he would emerge on Wednesday morning, but when I looked at him in the morning he looked brown. Andrea looked at him later and he looked like he was pinched. He died. When Momma cleaned him up last night, he was just liquid. This is the first one we had die in a chrysalis that did not fall when he was forming.

Running Total:

• Lost: 5, one butterfly just before emerging, two caterpillars-one fell while forming chrysalis–and two moldy eggs.
• Butterflies Released: 32
• Soon to be Released: 2 girls
• Roaming: 1
• Little Piggy: 1
• 20 mm caterpillars: 4
• 15 mm caterpillars: 1
• 10mm caterpillars: 2
• 5 mm caterpillars: 5
• 3 mm caterpillars: 10
• Eggs: 3

With all the humidity, we are having problems with mold! We find our caterpillars fresh milkweed and it gets moldy too fast.  We rescued two caterpillars, who are doing good.  But the eggs don’t hatch 🙁 . So we cut as much mold off the last one and are going to try leaving the lid open and watch to see what happens! Have to be careful if he hatches so he does not roam!

The other day we let go six butterflies! The total we have released is 27! We have lost two caterpillars and one egg (because of mold).

Last night we had a boy butterfly emerge!