Once the caterpillars were big, colorful, juicy-looking creatures with their red, white, and black stripes, they began lifting their heads and looking for desirable spaces to hang upside down and form their jewel-like chrysalis. Watching them lift their bodies to wriggle around, scoping for good locational prospects was amusing. You could almost see the thought bubbles emerging from their heads, analyzing the situation above them.
For a day or two the caterpillars adjusted themselves to their chosen locales, (all but one choosing the mesh lid of the terrarium) testing, spinning a cremaster, hanging upside down in a shape that resembles a “J”.
During this time we learned a couple of fascinating truths about the process of becoming a butterfly. First, while during transition it looks like the chrysalis is forming around the caterpillar, in fact the chrysalis has already formed beneath the final layer of caterpillar skin. When it's ready to enter the pupa phase of its cycle, it sheds its old skin to reveal the chrysalis hidden below.
All of the old skin is gradually pushed to the top of the chrysalis, near the cremaster. The last step of the chrysalis reveal is to wiggle around in alternating clockwise and counter-clockwise motions until the skin falls off. This was one of my favorite parts, as it truly looked as if the chrysalis was dancing, adept and energetic, to the beat of its own transformation soundtrack.
Second, inside the chrysalis the caterpillar turns into a sort of genetic soup the consistency of slime, completely reconfiguring itself into a butterfly from this matter. While the caterpillar and butterfly seem to have no relation to one another - they have different diets, different habitats, different styles of transportation - experiments have shown that butterflies remember their lives as caterpillars, and can solve puzzles from when they were just naive, prepubescent larva.
Even after the labor of turning into goop and reconfiguring into an almost entirely new insect, the butterfly then tunes into its magical genetic programming that communicates where to fly in Mexico, how to get there, and what steps are necessary to to ensure a successful flight.
Right now, as I write, the chrysalides are hanging in our terrarium, encasing our caterpillars as they turn into goop and ride out the transformation process.
In 10-14 days we will (hopefully) have 6 fresh Monarch butterflies ready for their yearly commute to Mexico, and it will be incredibly exciting to release them in the meadow.
While our Monarch release party on Sept 11 is currently at capacity, join our wait list in case there are those who can't make it, or in case we have to reschedule! We have predicted the caterpillars will be butterflies by then, but we can't be sure.
Thanks for tuning in for Part 2 of the WEC Monarch Diaries. More to come!
*If you want to learn more about the details of the caterpillar’s transformation, HowStuffWorks has a good description of the process.
