For our butterfly garden, we planted a bunch of Milkweed plants. We were fortunate enough to have tons of fat Monarch caterpillars on each plant. They came like that straight from this amazing nursery that we go to (Abell’s Nursery). They don’t spray pesticides. There are always butterflies fluttering around their plants.
After planting the milkweed, we counted 25 monarch caterpillars. There were most likely more since they hang under the leaves to eat. I was thrilled to watch these caterpillars much on the leaves. Their size indicated that they were within hours or days of forming their chrysalis.
Later that day, we went to check out the caterpillars. We noticed a large wasp hovering around the plants. Then, to our horrifying surprise, the wasp stung one of the caterpillars. White liquid squirted from the caterpillar and within a minute, the wasp had devoured the entire caterpillar. I was very upset and feared that the wasp would eat more of them. I thought about creating a cage around the plants to keep the wasps out, but we were busy that day and we went about our errands.
A few hours later, we returned home to find absolutely NO caterpillars on the milkweed plants. NOT ONE! I was heartbroken. These huge caterpillars only had a few days until they formed their chrysalis. At that point, I decided that I would start a little caterpillar nursery so that I could raise a few without wasp interference. Online, they sell pop-up mesh butterfly cases for $15.00 and up (plus shipping). I decided I couldn’t wait, so I went to Target and bought a pop-up mesh hamper and 3 milkweed plants.
The monarch butterflies definitely are laying eggs on our milkweed plants. I have already put 5 small caterpillars into the nursery. We released our second butterfly from the nursery this morning, and we have two that formed their chrysalis and the rest are still munching. Two have managed to disappear from spiders. I guess you can’t stop nature.
Here is a picture of my creation:
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3:47 pm
Andria,
I wanted to write to give you a big “THANK YOU”! I have recently started to “baby-sit” my small flock of monarch butterflies. Today, I witnessed the devastation of some local wasps on my monarchs larvae. I lost three fat bodies this morning alone!
I will construct my own nursery based on you easy and inventive model. I have my first chrysallis ready to open in 3 or so days!
Thank you for having this website and keep your posts up to date so we can follow your progress!
Congratulations!
Brandon, Florida
10:17 am
How exciting! I hope your butterfly cage is working out well for you. It should definitely help out with the wasps. In a recent visit to the Lukas Nursery & Butterfly Encounter in Oviedo FL, I found out that the netting on my little hamper-style cage is not sufficient to keep out parasites that might harm the caterpillars. If you start to see problems with their development, you might want to order a better netting for your cage (see below for the link to one website).
Another issue that I had was that as my caterpillars started their journey climbing to the top of the cage, the wasps would land on the side of the cage and would sting them and kill them through the material…just when I thought I had it all worked out! Since then, I tend to move the cage inside once they get big enough to form their chrysalis.
I have recently seen a number of different types of butterfly netting and cages/Terrariums. Some very interesting ones that allow you to still place potted plants inside are found at the following website:
http://educationalscience.com/terrariums.htm
I look forward to hearing more about your little guys!
Best of luck to you!