Butterflies

We have had caterpillars & watched them grow into butterflies each spring for years. I think Bek was only 4 when we started doing it.

I usually like to time it so that we release them at the end of May. The weather is usually nice then and it often coincides with them talking about them in pre-school or school. This year we were late. Mostly because I was putting the house on the market and didn't think a couple tubs of caterpillars on the mantle created the best aesthetic ... but really also I was just super busy with all the usual end of the school year stuff AND putting the house on the market & kept forgetting to order them!

I finally got around to it just before school ended & the kids were delighted when the 2 tubs of very tiny caterpillars arrived. One of them was a lot smaller than the rest. He / she also grew much more slowly than the others, in fact several times we thought it might be dead but it eventually also made a chrysalis.

On Sunday Rick was leaving for a trip, so even though that last little guy was still in his chrysalis we decided to release the other 9 so Rick could be there.

Rebekah was in charge of making sure the net didn't collapse on them.

Rick was the "butterfly getter".

Emily went first. This one crawled on her hand for a while.

Then Jake. I think we went though a few trying to get one to stay on his hand. There was a slight breeze & most of them flew away the second they hit air. It's why I order 2 tubs.

Then Jane. I think several also flew before touching her hand too.

OK, confession time.  Remember the Ladybug Massacre? Well now I am also a butterfly maim-er.

All but that one small guy had made a chrysalis. I thought I really should take the one tub of five & transfer it to the net while waiting for the last one in the other tub .... but just didn't get around to it. Then one night I woke up at 2am from a dream that they were hatching out in the tub & suffocating. I pondered getting up right them to move them ... but it was 2am & I was tired and the net is in the storage room in the attic. I thought I'd do it first thing in the morning .... and I did but I was too late. One butterfly had emerged and hadn't been able to spread its wings to let them dry properly, so one wing was kind of bent. I looked like it hadn't been out long and I felt really guilty. Maybe if I'd got up and moved them in the night it would have been OK. Every time the kids would "aw" over him and say how sad they were that it's wing didn't flutter properly it added to my guilt!

After we had released all the others the injured one was the last one. Once before, we had one that hatched out with a bad wing (that one was just nature & not my fault at all.) We had just put it on a flower in the garden and hoped for the best for it. We decided to do that with this one.

But first I let the kids all hold it.

Was it wrong to take advantage of my negligence?

Next year I promise to put them into the net the minute all of them have formed their chrysalis!