Weird and Wonderful

  Mother Nature has this weird and wonderful thing down pat.  Mark and I went out to purge the spinach patch of snails when he discovered something that I found to be rather remarkable.  He pointed out a chrysalis that had been attached under the back porch railing.  Hmmm? Does it not seem to be a tad cold for a butterfly to be thinking of developing?  I pondered that thought as I photographed the tiny case.  

  The case appears to be that of a Monarch Butterfly.  The caterpillar also seems to be close to emerging as a full grown butterfly.  The chrysalis starts out as bright green but as the butterfly inside starts to develop, the case starts to show the colors of the butterfly's wings.  This one was already darkening so it should not be long before the side splits and the critter emerges.  It will hang for a while under the railing while it unfolds and flexes its wings.  Then off into the world it will fly...cold weather or not.

  Monarch Butterflies are a bit different that most other butterflies.  While they go through basically the same changes from egg to adult during the spring and summer months, come late fall, things change.  The average life span of the adult warm-weather critters is anywhere from two to five weeks.  During that time, the butterfly eats, mates and lays eggs.  The eggs will hatch in a few days and the critters starts life as tiny caterpillars.  For two weeks, the caterpillars eat milkweed.  They grow and grow until finally each will create a chrysalis.  Inside its chrysalis, each caterpillar will go through metamorphosis.  The change takes about two weeks then a beautiful butterfly crawls out to start the cycle all over again.  The late fall butterfly crawls out of the chrysalis, eats but does not mate.  Instead, it starts migrating.  Its life lasts up to eight months. During that time the butterfly migrates southward and mates once it reaches its destination.  The new batch of butterflies emerge usually in February or March. These will start the migration back northward.  They will mate, lay eggs and let the cycle continue.  Our friend seems to be a bit early.

  I am curious to see if the critter survives the next few nights.  Our weather has taken a turn to the chilly side which cannot feel too happy for the morphing butterfly.  Hopefully, since the chrysalis is dangling on the south side of the porch, it will be protected from the icy winds.  I will keep watch.  Oh...one obviously just did its metamorphosis since right next to this case was an empty shell.  Hopefully, that butterfly did well!  I better plant more milkweed!