Waiting game

This summer, I was excited to find that a painted lady butterfly (Vanessa cardui) had made its chrysalis on the house.  I visited it several times a day, hoping to catch the moment when the butterfly would emerge.

The painted lady butterfly (Vanessa cardui) chrysalis that I observed in Maine in July.

Then, one morning, I went to check on the chrysalis only to find that it was completely gone -- not even the empty shell was left.  I was unhappy that I had missed my chance to see the butterfly emerging, and worse yet, that the chrysalis might have been eaten by a predator before the butterfly had completed its development.

Last weekend, I came across another chance to observe a butterfly (or perhaps a moth) emerging.  At the front of the house, there were two green caterpillars.  These caterpillars were on the move (one climbing up the house and the other crawling along the hose), which suggested to me that they had finished eating and were searching out places to pupate.  Given my experience over the summer, I decided that this time I would go about things differently.

One of the caterpillars that I found in the garden last weekend.

I collected one of the caterpillars into a jar, gave it a stick to climb on, poked holes in the lid... and waited.  Two days later, it pupated, forming an interesting-looking chrysalis.

Two days later, the caterpillar had turned turned into a pupa.

Now I am waiting again, but with much better odds of success.