Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Garden Delight

What kind of Caterpillar is this???
Read more and find out!

Just this past weekend, when my husband was out in the backyard trimming our Tangerine tree, he pointed out a very strange looking caterpillar on one of the branch cuttings.  It looked like a lizard at first glance and kind of gave me the creeps...but, I decided it would be fun to keep it in an acrylic box (handy for more than just beads!) and watch it do it's thing, ya know,the whole "metamorphosis thing". My daughter, a big time bug lover, named it Lolly.  After placing Lolly in her (I'll just stick with 'she' since her name is Lolly...) new home with a couple of twigs and some leaves she almost immediately started getting ready to chrysalize.  By the next morning she was in complete chrysalis mode, hanging at a 45 degree angle from one of the twigs. 


Lolly looks just like this right now...
shhh, she's sleeping.

At this point I still had NO idea what Lolly was, a moth, a butterfly?  And what type?    After a little internet research, aka Google, I finally discovered Lolly was a Giant Swallowtail Butterfly!

Giant Swallowtail Butterfly
Isn't she pretty?

So, now we wait...10-14 days according to my vast "research".  I can't wait to meet Lolly and set her free to start the whole cycle over again.  I plan to take some video of the event and post it here.  Stay tuned!

1 comment:

Caroline said...

It is a very creep looking caterpillar. I used to do the same things as a child, I watched many creepy caterpillars turn into beautiful butterflies.

 
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