Science in the House - Third Times a Charm

Just for fun - and because these are things I would have liked to have done when I was a kid - and because my friend CK introduced me to the cool idea - we are doing some science in the house. One day we were driving home from going to coffee and giving the boys some time at a local park to pee on trees (potty training sometimes has to be creative - and if the novelty of peeing on a tree will get them excited about keeping their undies (do boys wear undies?) then I say - let's go pee on trees baby!) - anyway, we were driving home and CK was mentioning that she needed to find a milkweed patch to get some leaves for their caterpillar. As we rounded State Farm's campus we saw them - tons and tons of milkweed plants. CK said when she was little her mom would bring a caterpillar in - put it in between the window and the screen - feed it milkweed and watch it chrysalis and turn into a butterfly. How Cool Is That?


And as we searched the weeds for some food we also found a few more monarch caterpillars. The boys stayed in the car - as they could not be bothered with our adventures apparently - too many bugs. Sheesh - boys! However, once we produced a few milkweed plants and 2 more caterpillars they were all about "can I see him" (assuming the larvae were boys - sheesh - boys!). And home we went. Immediately TheKing and I placed our caterpillar between the screen and window - and TheKing kept asking "Is He Not Dead Yet?" - like he was going to die any moment. When I asked what his name would be it turned out Ishenotdeadyet was his name. Aptly named I must say - because Ishenotdeadyet promptly died. I suspect the spider that showed up on the scene the next day.

One caterpillar down.

Thinking we would try again we went out and found Sally - also named by TheKing. Sally lived a smidgie longer - we put her in a different window just in case the sun fried Ishenotdeadyet. See we have those idiotic windows that crank out - the screen is on the inside - so I thought perhaps the glass being on the outside might have caused a baking effect on our first larvae pet. This time Sally was placed in a window that had little sun. Didn't help her much though - well........she did live 3 days. Then she died too. How were CK's doing? They had 2 after our trip to the milkweed. Diego and Dora. Dora and Diego ate and ate and ate - she documented it on her facebook. And then Dora went to Chrysalis and croaked - they think a spider got her. Diego however turned into a really really pretty chrysalis.

Two caterpillars down.

And honestly I figured we had killed enough butterflies. So we were stopping. Did I mention I have been biking a lot lately? A lot A lot. And each morning (or afternoon) that I did bike I noticed that there were tons and tons of caterpillars to dodge. They were making pilgrimages across the roads. So once day I decided to take one home. This one was much fuzzier then the other two. This one was much more active. This one was NOT placed in a window. Instead we looked him up on the computer to see what to do. There are few instructions outside of "buying" a kit. So we made our own caterpillar apartment out of an old tupperware cereal container. Wrapped an opening with plastic and then poked holes. This way we could see what was going on. SuperStar named this one - Fuzzy - Sheesh - girls - so original that it is retro really. And so far - 4 days in - Fuzzy lives. Fuzzy likes potato vine - so we gave him some - a lot really - and he seems happy. TheKing has taken him to school and we will have him go back again when he cocoons. See Fuzzy will not chrysalis. We have learned a ton of things from this experience - besides our windows are crap for raising butterflies. We have learned the following:
* Fuzzy caterpillars are always Moths
* Hairless caterpillars are always Butterflies
* Caterpillars don't actually eat fruit or veggies like Carle suggests in his book
* Moths Cocoon
* Butterflies Chrysalis
~ that last bit was fun to learn because BigGuy mentioned that he thought chrysalis was the "cool" way to say cocoon these days - but turns out there are really 2 different processes.
* Some cocoons are done on the ground - which is what Fuzzy is working on now - I thought perhaps he had died, but he reared his head up in his tangle of silk and leaves - he is actually going to live long enough to cocoon!! How totally cool is that?

And - it embraces the idea - Third Time Is a Charm