More Butterflies

All 5 of the butterfly pupa (the chrysalis stage) have produced adult butterflies now! The final butterfly emerged this morning. It is really hard to take decent pictures through netting, but here is a shot of a butterfly that has *just* emerged from its chrysalis ~ it is hanging on to the bottom of the paper disc and has not unfurled its wings yet.



This one shows both the underside of the wings (speckled grayish in color, that's what you see when the wings are closed) and the upperside of the wings, which is brilliant orange, white and black when the wings are open!


If you look very closely in this pic you can see the butterfly's proboscis, the long tube through which it sucks nectar. It is very skinny and black and is curving down into the orange slice.


Here is a shot of all 5. When they are all flying pretty well, we may close off one room of the house and let them fly loose! Our zoology book says this is perfectly fine as long as we have a butterfly net handy to catch them later, and there are no other pets in the room at the time. :-) After that we will release them outside.

No-one wants to see them go, but the children realize that butterflies were not meant to live in nets for their entire life span. And their life as adults only lasts a few weeks, so we want them to enjoy their short life in the great outdoors.

This is among the best $14.95 I have ever spent!!