Betsy, that's good that the butterfly was able to free itself with a little help. I volunteer at the Museum of Science and Industry in Tampa in the butterfly exhibit and I'm always getting the question about if you touch a butterfly, will it die. I usually use the example of if you see a butterfly in a spider web, but I like your scenario, too. It's a fine line telling people that, yes you can touch them and not kill them, but at the same time, don't touch them unless you absolutely have to!
From experience, I've found that nature very rarely needs our help and tends to do better when we just leave things alone. I'm not counting the parts where we've already messed things up and have to go back and try to fix them, FYI.
And if you've been doing this as long as I have (seven years) you have plenty of pictures of butterflies laying eggs! But it's still cool every time I see it!
