A Week of Butterfly Nature Study
This week our main focus was butterflies! Sure, we did math, history readings, vocabulary, and all the other necessary subjects, but mostly, we watched butterflies.
Two weeks ago, we had caterpillars. Kathryn was fascinated with them. The rest of us were pretty amazed at how fast they grew!
After about a week, they turned into chrysalises, but not all on the same day. One of the weirdest things to me is how the chrysalis will shake like crazy if it’s bumped. This is to ward off predators.
Once they all turned into chrysalises, we moved them into the butterfly habitat. That was a week ago Thursday. Eight days later, the first butterfly emerged. We learned by watching that the chrysalis turns very dark a few hours before the butterfly comes out.
Kathryn wasn’t here at the time (she was with her dad), but Lindsey was excited and immediately called Kathryn to tell her all about it. Lacy the WonderDog was fascinated by the fact that we had a little flying insect in this thing where she could poke it with her nose. The remaining chrysalises practiced their shaking to try to scare her off, but that just made her poke it more.
On Sunday, two more butterflies emerged while we were at church, and one more late that afternoon. Kathryn came back from her dad’s that night, and was relieved we still had one more butterfly to go. She really wanted to see it happen!
Monday, Kathryn sat watching them all morning, even having her breakfast as she stared in eager anticipation. When she had to get up for any reason, I was on call to watch.
Finally, all that waiting was rewarded. It’s unbelievable how fast they come out and get those wings unfurled. Though this was the second time we’ve done this with caterpillars-into-butterflies, we’ve never seen one come out of the chrysalis. This time, we did!
Kathryn and Lindsey feed and play with the butterflies a few times each day. It tickles a bit to have a butterfly walk on your hand. If you have sugar-water on your finger, they’ll drink it, which is a great way to watch their proboscis unroll!
We know from experience that they’ll likely start mating soon. We don’t know how many males or females we have. Their lifespan is only a couple of weeks, so we’ll plan to release them before they die.
Until then, we’ll enjoy them as much as we can. And maybe even imitate them. (licorice rolls make a nifty proboscis)
Drop in and visit Kris for more weekly summaries from other homeschool families: Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers.
Wife, mom, J-ma. Introvert who enjoys good books, sunshine, and authentic conversation. Often seen with a steaming mug of tea in hand – unless it’s lost yet again in the microwave. Read more »
Oh, I love this! My kids really enjoy butterflies and identifying them. We really need to look into buying one of those wonderful butterfly habitats. I like the really large ones (like you have pictured) but have only seen the smaller ones in catalogues. If you don’t mind me asking, where did you find yours?
Awesomely cool post :-)!
Julie
Julie –
Actually my wonderful cousin Jonnia gave us this habitat, but it came from Insect Lore, which is where we bought the caterpillars both times we did this.
Thanks :-)! I’ll look into it. Julie
This is a great post. I remember raising butterflies when I was a kid, but sadly, mine aren’t too interested in the idea. I am glad she finally got to see one. She is a busy kid! I love the licorice proboscis!!
We’ve always enjoyed “raising” butterflies. Like you said, it’s so much fun (and interesting) to watch the entire process!
Wow, this is awesome. We haven’t got round to raising butterflies yet but I’ll have to look into it! Thanks for sharing this post.
We’ve done this a couple of time…and have a ladybug and ant farm kit waiting. It’s LOTS of fun to watch the changes!
My daughters want to do this, it does look fun. We will have to order the kit. We already have the ladybug habitat though that we have been waiting on to order the “live” occupants. They wouldn’t ship because of temps here. Loved all the pictures.
Blessings,
Renita
http://www.krazykuehnerdays.com
That is entirely too much fun! My daughter LOVES loves loves (did I say loves?) insects, and she would love to do something like this. Hmmm. Soooo interesting! Thanks for sharing!
What a wonderful recap and photos. We kept a few batches of silkworms two summers ago, and they were also amazing to watch as they went through all their cycles.
Butterfly units are so much fun! Love the pic of your dog with the butterflies!=)
We have not done butterflies yet, but are looking forward to it. Our dog, Prissie, would be just like your dog. She likes to know everything that’s going on.
What fun!! And you did an excellent job of capturing it. I bet your girls will remember this a long time.
This is awesome! We are doing the exact same kit, and our first butterfly just emerged today! We are so extremely excited…I can totally see my kids waiting by the next chrysalis too!