This week, we celebrated the release of the first of our monarchs to emerge from its chrysalis!
We have been keeping a watchful eye on the classroom caterpillars and after seeing many go into
"J-shape" and then to chrysalis, we knew this day would come soon. It has been exciting to witness the wondrous life cycle of this beautiful insect first hand in our classroom.
Before his release, the class shared their well-wishes for his migration to Mexico and watched him fly to a nearby tree (ask your child how we knew it was a male butterfly!). In the course of gathering milkweed for our remaining caterpillars to eat from the side garden (by the cafeteria) we made an amazing discovery - monarch caterpillars in our very own Lilja garden!
The milkweed plants near the cafeteria are host plants for returning monarchs to lay eggs which hatch and grow into more monarch butterflies. Once we spotted one, we kept seeing more and more and more! If you drop off or pick up your child, ask them to show you where we found the caterpillars. We plan to make a sign to let people know that these milkweed plants play an important role in the life cycle of our monarch butterflies and as such, we need to preserve and protect them. Many gardeners consider these plants undesirable weeds and pull them out, but this garden is now under our protection!
Check out the pictures below of the caterpillars we found and where to find them in the side garden:
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