So, what happened to the butterflies?

Some of the messages I got after my hiatus have been about the butterflies. I got a lot of questions about how to raise them and also some of you were concerned if they made it. So ,here is the rest of their story.

Butterflies on my little garden in japan

After making a reinforcement for the butterflies house they had more support and a better space to keep turning into chrysalis. Then, after a couple of weeks finally the first ones started to hatch. They were beautiful Indian Fritillary (Argynnis hyperbius) butterflies.

They hatched one by one

On that initial batch the first one was a male, the next two were females and then a male again. I feed them some old watermelon and orange slices and they seem to enjoy them a lot. They were happy flying around the room and resting on the window enjoying the sun.

It is important to let them stretch out and harden their wings

Over the next two weeks the rest of the chrysalis continue to open and the butterflies came out. I let each one go after their wings had harden enough. In the end, all but two of the rest of the butterflies came out. I wish all would have survived, but It was still a good success rate. I think the two missing were hurt that time the wind knock the cage over.

They like eating fruit

It was really cool to see them grow like that and pop out from their cocoon. I hope I have another chance of raising more butterflies next spring.

The butterflies transformed into chrysalis

Well, the butterflies keep on growing and eating like crazy. I had to change them to a bigger house because now they are so many of them. Also, they completely finished the pansies from my garden, all the way to the main trunk, so, now I have resorted to other sources. I usually just ride around to a park and cut a bit of pansies for them, but I have to be doing it often, because they eat a lot.

The caterpillars eating the last of the pansies

A bunch of them already turned chrysalis. It is a very nice looking cocoon. It has small golden spots that shine very bright with the sun. It is so much fun to see how they change. They do two molts before making the next transformation and then they start walking around to find a cozy space. Once there, they tie their feet with some silk and hang upside down like bats. Then in a day or two they shed their skin again and turn into chrysalis. They are so fast and secretive that I didn't had a chance to see them do it, but I have seen others before so it's ok.

This is their new house

They seem to be Indian Fritillary (Argynnis hyperbius), the caterpillars and the pupa match, but still have to wait until they hatch. I could be in for a big surprise.

The only thing that worries me now is that many of them fell down because of the wind. I guess the netting that houses them is not the best material for them to latch their silk. I hope the bump to the floor doesn't hurt them and they still develop well. I will build a support structure and hang them again so they have space once they come out.

A bunch of them turned into chrysalis

The swallowtails I used to have lasted around four weeks as caterpillars and another four weeks as chrysalis. This ones only took 3 weeks as caterpillars, so I think that their next stage will be short as well. But still, I have no idea what to expect. Let's see what happens

Raising butterflies!

A couple weeks ago, after seeing most of the plants a bit down because of the change of season, I decided on renewing the plants on the flower boxes, but, when I was about to take away the pansies, I noticed it had four caterpillars living happily and eating all. I had no heart to kill them, and after a bit of thought I decided to keep them until they change to butterflies. I think it will be fun to see them grow.

Some small caterpillars from my garden

Back at my country I used to have a small "ranch" of swallowtails. Every year for sure, a bunch of butterflies used to lay eggs on the orange tree at the back yard. I would collect the newborns and bring them inside to a netting box I made, there I kept on feeding them until they turn to pupa and eventually to butterflies. Once they had become butterflies I had them in the house for a bit and then I release them in the yard. It was a small but very prolific farm were I got to have up to 32 butterflies growing at once.

These caterpillars eat pansies like crazy

I had to stop having that small swallowtail butterfly farm some years ago because I didn't have time to keep them and also because after some ants established in that tree the baby caterpillars didn't had a chance to be born there anymore. But, I enjoyed those times a lot, and I had always wanted to try again. Maybe with these caterpillars I will be able to start a new little farm. It is really cool having them growing and flying around.

Here they are on their first small feeding box

I had them on a small box and feed them the pansies on my garden, but they soon outgrow that and now I have made them a cage of their own. I also have been picking out some more caterpillars from around and now they are 15 of them. I hope most of them will make it to butterfly form. Back when I had the swallowtails I had a success rate of 100% with every small caterpillar eventually turning to butterfly, but I am not sure if these ones will do as good.

This is one of the swallowtails from back home

To be honest, I am not sure what kind they are, or even if they are butterflies at all. For all I knew they can be moths or even some crazy beetle. They do look like leopard butterflies (Argyreus hyperbius), but I can only know for sure once they hatch. Hopefully they are something nice, and I will have the chance to keep growing them every year. Any idea what they might be?