Week 143 Pictures

A few weeks ago, we bought a milkweed plant and placed it in a mesh "butterfly nursery" and set it up in a window indoors.


Later that day, we took five Monarch caterpillars off the milkweed plants in the garden and put them in the nursery. A few days later, they had all gone into cuccoons.

Here we are two weeks later, and four of the five hatched together on one day. The other hatched the day before. Today we took the butterfly nursery outdoors, opened the flap, and let the butterflies loose. The all flew away, save one. One of the butterflies was sick. That's what we told Reilly, at least. I'm not sure exactly what was wrong with the butterfly, but its wings were pale, and the little guy couldn't fly. Such is nature.

Here is a photo of the last heatlhy butterfly about to take off:

For more photos, click here.