From Egg to Caterpillar
Monday, July 22, 1996
My dad and my sisters and I went on a nature walk today out in the
country.
We saw lots of milkweed and Dad said we should look on the leafs to see if
we could find any Monarch Butterfly caterpillars. We didn't find any caterpillars,
but underneath one leaf we found a very little bump that looked like it could be an
egg.
We took the leaf home with us in a jar and put it on our front porch.
Friday, July 26, 1996
We checked the egg today and it looked
different. Instead of being greenish-white
it was now very dark. Later when we looked
the egg was gone. We looked all
over the leaf and discovered a very tiny caterpillar - it was smaller than
a piece of rice!
Saturday, July 30, 1996
Dad brought books home today on Monarch butterflies. We learned that the
newborn caterpillars
first eat their eggshell, then they eat the little hairs on the
bottom of the milkweed leaves. When they are
around 6 hours old, they are
finally able to eat the leaf itself. That's just what our caterpillar did.
Our caterpillar is now a lot bigger than when we first saw him. He eats almost
all day - he has already chewed
a big hole in the leaf he's on. A couple times
we have seen him crawl to a new spot and just sit there for hours, without
eating. When he does that he doesn't look as green as he usually does. Dad
thinks he might be shedding his skin.
We noticed today that the caterpillar now has little black "horns" at the front
and back ends of his body.
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Created October 23, 1996
by
Patrick Persons
Canton, MI
personsp@metronet.lib.mi.us