Metamorphosis #3

On Saturday, as I flew around my house preparing for Tracy and Nate’s visit, I noticed changes in the cocoons hanging under the eaves of my porch.

In the morning, the moths shed their cocoons and staggered out with gigantic abdomens, as above. I raced to teh interwebs and figured out that they’re probably a variety of tiger moth.

This site (go Cats!)  provided great visual aids to help me taxonomically and geographically placing the moth.

Over the course of the day, each of the moths shed their abdomens by laying a patch of eggs. The eggs are embedded in yellow-ochre fuzz, and the mom moths continue to stick by the patches today – five days later.

I have often noticed that paying close attention opens up new layers to the world. While photographing the two moths from my previous posts, I found several more in the hidden places of my porch.

Metamorphosis #2

Yesterday, while I was doing other things, the caterpillar in yesterday’s post shed its furry skin and became a chrysalis, or pupa:

Here’s what’s going on with it, courtesy of Microsoft Encarta:

Within the pupa, the tissues and organs of the caterpillar break down into a soupy liquid, and then reassemble into the tissues and organs of the adult butterfly.(Whoa! –ed.) Groups of cells known as the imaginal discs remain complete, and the adult butterfly’s structure takes shape as directed by these cells. The imaginal discs work in tandem with hormones, chemical messengers that carry information between different parts of the body, to program the insect’s development, much as silicon chips direct the operation of a computer

It seems the process could take a while:

The pupal stage may last anywhere from one week to several years, depending on the species and the weather.

I’ll keep you posted.

Big Bugs

Two caterpillars have hunkered down under the eaves of my front porch – big ones! I found one chrysalis and one huge, fuzzy guy turning himself into a chrysalis. Here the evil twins (my dogs, Skippy and Juno) guard the bugs and the house:
If you’re standing on my porch facing away from the door, the still-fuzzy caterpillar is directly in front of you. The one already en-chrysalized is to your left in the corner. Yeah, yeah, the one on the left looks like dog poo – but it’s not! My dogs are too old to climb the porch ceiling and poop upside down. I’m sure it’s a moth chrysalis.

I’ll keep an eye on these guys and post pictures. I would love to photograph them moment they break loose!

Below is an artalicious photo of my leaded glass porch window.