Chestnut Class Butterfly Farm
As part of their work on the book 'The very hungry caterpillar', Chestnut class children observed the development of caterpillars to pupa to butterfly.
Although it has been wet, it has been warm and the caterpillars grew very quickly and spun their cocoons. Unfortunately, 4 of them chose to emerge during the weekend, so the children couldn't watch them as much as we'd hoped because they can only be kept in their basket for a couple of days.
We were able to see the first one dry it's wings and pump the colour into it's wings. The butterflies were kept in an observation basket decorated with leaves, twigs and flowers and fed with a sugar solution. We could see them drink from the flowers when they uncurled their very long 'tongues'. We were able to release 5 more 'Painted Ladies' into the school grounds.
The caterpillars are tiny when they arrive - they're the tiny black dots in the pot! | Even though the caterpillars are small, they are interesting and the magnifying glasses help!
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One cocoon is hanging down from the lid and the other caterpillars (now huge!) are very active. |
The first butterfly!
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