Dispatch From the Butterfly Ranch

Egg, larva, pupa, adult - the four basic life stages in an insect’s life cycle.  I learned all of this in the Fourth Grade.  I’ll be visiting these four stages this season on the Butterfly Ranch mostly as it relates to monarch butterflies but not necessarily restricted to them.  We've seen any number of different butterflies this spring but it is the monarch that dominates the count.

From yesterday's walk there is this.

Monarch females generally lay a single egg on a single milkweed plant (host plant for the monarch) usually on the underside of a leaf.  They glue it to the leaf and it will remain there until a tiny caterpillar (larva) emerges in three to five days.  We’ve been examining milkweed plants on our walks and finding a lot of eggs laid on the surface of the leaf.  To be fair it is easier to look for eggs there than on the underside but I’m just sayin’.   

In any event they're rather tiny eggs, white and usually smaller than a pinhead.  Look carefully and you will find them.  Females carry with them all the eggs they will lay and after 300 to 500 deposits they’re done! 

Stay tuned for the larva stage.