Hummingbird and Butterfly Gardening: I have babies!, 0 by konkreteblond

konkreteblond wrote:
I am not sure how many "broods" they can have each year. Each batch of mine could be from the same butterfly or all from different ones.

First is the egg, which takes about 5-7 days to hatch. Then they go thru I believe 5 instars, which is when they shed their skin and are bigger and sometimes a different color. I'm not sure how long each instar is because it's impossible for me to catch them "morphing" when they are really small. I have raised so many that I have actually not paid much attention and forgot some of the details. I will have to pay attention this time.

When they are thru eating and ready to make their chrysalis, they will start wandering around. On the ground they could travel a long ways from where they started. In a cage they just wander in circles for hours. Finally they find a place and secrete this silk thread and attach themselves to something.

About 12-24 hrs after that their skin will split and the formed chrysalis will come out!! It is SO weird!! The thing that really amazed me the first time I saw it, was that their skin came off like a costume, FEET and all!!! LOL

The chrysalis wiggles around a while and attaches itself again and dries. After about a week or two of going thru it's DNA meltdown, the end will split open again and the butterfly pops out. It will hang for a few hrs and lets it's wings dry. I release them as soon as their wings are dry and they appear to be ready. The male BST's are always ready to GO. Monarch's are slow and like to hang around a little longer, which makes for good pics.