The time has come - our caterpillars are changing! This is yesterday. In the morning, it seemed that they were all on the top of the cup. We went to church and then to the everglades, so we were gone most of the day and when we got back, one was hanging in a J. After the kids went to bed, I noticed another had "J'd".
Rob noticed later in the night that 4 of them were in Js and this morning the 5th one had made the J and the first one had made his/her chrysalis.I caught one making the chrysalis and took a video. I was surprised how fast it happened...and how quiet everyone was while I took the video! Caleb's "word" these days is "cool" which you'll hear.
As of this typing, only one has yet to molt off the caterpillar skin.
In other small critter news, we caught new fish this weekend. We caught many more, but kept 12-15 (they are hard to count while they are swimming!).
Most of them are mosquito fish, but one is a sailfin molly. Both kinds of fish were part of Rob's PhD research. Most of them are males, but there are a few females too, so we will definitely have baby fish! However, they will probably just end up as fish food!
They are all dull grey, but the neat thing is that as the males duke it out over who is the most impressive to the females, one male will emerge as the dominant male. He will become more colorful. More colorful than this, but 2 days in the tank, this guy is already starting to stand out. If you look closely, you can see this top fin starting to turn golden.
Very cool video! It does happen fast. We didn't actually get to see any of ours make the chrysalis (because it happened too fast), so to quote Caleb, cool, cool, cool. Also, the other day I saw a commercial for another company who sells the caterpillars. I cracked up when they showed the caterpillars growing - each time the container was spotlessly clean.
ReplyDeleteThat is very funny! Ours was disgusting! I actually saw two of ours make the chrysalis. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.
ReplyDelete