Monarchs in our Garden!

I went outside to water the school garden today and what should I see? Almost a dozen monarch caterpillars eating milkweed leaves!  They are big and look awesome!  I also saw a Monarch butterfly flitting about the plants.  Maybe she was looking for a place to lay some eggs!

A Monarch Caterpillar in our Butterfly Garden!

What a surprise!  After two years of growing milkweed as part of our pollinator garden, I found a monarch caterpillar!

Three different types of milkweed in our garden!

Busy exploring the indoor habitat.

It started out quite small, but doubles in size every few days.

After showing all the classes the hungry caterpillar, I noticed it was getting sluggish and put the caterpillar back in our garden to finish it's journey!  Hopefully we will find more caterpillars.  There certainly is evidence they are around!

Kindergarten Observes Caterpillars!

We have been watching the very, very small caterpillars eat and eat and then grow and grow!

Little caterpillars in little containers.

This is a cocoon from a silkworm. Some of the classes
wondered how a cocoon is different from a chrysalis. 

It's eating!

It's got hairs on it!

It's eating upside down.

Mine is walking on the top of the container and it's not falling.

Look at it move!