Mom and I went to see "The Book of Life" at the movies today. It's about the Day of the Dead and I didn't see one Monarch in the whole movie! But seriously, it was a cute movie. It was just us two in the theater so I got to laugh as loud as I wanted. And Mom started singing along to one of the songs until I gave her the elbow.
But before that, I had butterfly things to tend to. My Orange-Barred Sulphur chrysalis looked like it was going to come out last night and sure enough, I got up to go to the bathroom about 5:30 am and that butterfly was out. I went back to sleep and the butterfly behaved itself. Even after I woke up, I let it hang for a while so it could warm up outside. My room is on the north side of the house and my weather station thingie said it was 69 degrees in my room. My room is also quite dark so I think that helped the butterfly to not freak out while I was asleep.
So I woke up and let it go. It still couldn't fly very well but I managed to get it on the porterweed. This is a male Orange-Barred. You can tell by the orange bar on the upper wings. Also, check out the scalloping on the lower wings. I love a fresh butterfly because you really get to see all the little details you miss on the more worn ones. Oh, it also landed on me. Often when I release new butterflies they fly to the closest thing they see. Sometimes, that happens to be me.
I managed to snap a quick pic of a Long-Tailed Skipper.
I took a look at the pipevine and would you believe I found eggs AND caterpillars! It's November - what are those Polydamas doing? FYI, I brought them all in because this bunch should overwinter and I don't want to worry about chrysalises when I'm cleaning the garden up. Plus, Dad keeps insisting he's going to replace the fence. Here's some of the eggs I found. They're yellow to begin with but you can see in one picture they are changing color as the caterpillars form.
Then, there were the caterpillars!
And for a little advice on how to find cats...if you see a leaf that looks like this, check the back of it. Jackpot! And stinkhorns.
And then I found a Cloudless Sulphur cat! This is another example of the yellow form that is yellow because it's eating the flowers. I cannot emphasize this enough, folks. When the cassias and sennas are in bloom - check the flowers and buds for the caterpillars! Do not waste time looking at the leaves! I brought this cat inside, too even though I'm not having the best of luck with Sulphurs lately.
And then, I spotted one of the Polydamas culprits (because it takes two to tango, folks).
About this time Mom pulled in the driveway and yelled that there was a Gulf Frit fritting about. It deigned to stop for a quick photo op.
