Raising Butterflies

Posted by: Charlotte's Doodad Blog on: 06/25/2011

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Raising butterflies can be a great experience for grade school aged children. Monarchs are one of the most ideal to raise at home. This can be a great hands on experience for them. You can teach and show them the different life stages of the butterfly.

If you want to help teach your children about their life cycle, one of the best things you can do is pick up a book on them. Monarchs use common milkweed as a food source, along with laying their eggs on them. If you want an easy way to get monarch eggs, you can plant @@AMAZONTEXT;B003ADDCI6;milkweed@@  in your garden. Monarch eggs look like a tiny white football often on the underside of milkweed leaves. To collect the egg take a pair of scissors and clip off the leaf it is attached to. Once you have clipped the leaf, put it into a Tupperware container.

Now this is a good temporary home for your egg. It wont take long before they hatch and turn into tiny caterpillars. The caterpillar will need new milkweed leaves every couple of days. Make sure to remove old leaves, since they will mold before too long. Your caterpillar will grow quickly and as it does you can move the caterpillar and milkweed into a @@AMAZONTEXT;B003E46ER2;butterfly net house@@. This is a great place to house your caterpillar until it completes its change to a butterfly. Just make sure that when you open the top you are very careful of any chrysalis that may on the top.

A Monarch chrysalis is a bright green and will remain this color until right before the butterfly immerges. When the butterfly is within 24 to 48 hours of emerging the chrysalis turns clear so you can actually see the monarch wings.

The @@AMAZONTEXT;B001SAR9OQ;butterfly book@@ is a great resource to learn more about housing butterflies and attracting them around your house. Making for a great learning resource for your kids.

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