18 September 2015

Monarch chrysalis


This has been described as the result of an "escaped classroom caterpillar."  I'm quite certain the situation was artificially created by placing the book over the caterpillar's enclosure, then returning it to the shelf - but it's still a clever result.

Via imgur.

8 comments:

  1. Yes! I am amazed to see that the author of this book and I are the last two English speakers to care enough to use the subjunctive mood.

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    1. And now I notice that your earlier post was a "possible afterlife" entitled _Subjunctive_. Odd coincidence.

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    2. No, you're not. The subjunctive mood is alive and well in my writings.

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    3. Makes me wonder if Oscar Meyer would do it differently these days...."Oh, I wish I were an Oscar Meyer wiener...."

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  2. Soon after I emailed you about my monarch caterpillars they completely disappeared. I hope they went into chrysalis form, but we searched and searched and couldn't find any... Could they have spun their chrysalis on the interior of a nearby holly bush (where we could not search)?

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    1. It's unlikely they wandered far to pupate. If the milkweed was healthy, they would favor just hanging from a stem or leaf there. I would bet they were victims of predation - birds (they learn not to after the first one, but that's small consolation for the first one), wasps, ants, etc. That's why my wife and I like to bring the cats into the screen porch whenever we can. We've had over a hundred fly away so far this summer.

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  3. http://www.amusingplanet.com/2015/09/petaloudes-valley-of-butterflies.html

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    1. The author of the piece conflates butterflies and moths, but it certainly must be a magical phenomenon to see.

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