Wordy Wednesday

We have our first chrysalis from the caterpillars!      It formed overnight, so we can't say really whether Tuesday or Wednesday would be the right answer.   So lets just say anybody who guessed either Tuesday or Wednesday was right!  So Katie Isabella, Annie, Cody, Island Cats, and Beaded Tail were all correct!

Now let us take you on a little journey about how this happens.     When the caterpillar is finished eating all it is going to eat, it does an extra large poop, and soon after that,  it drops from the plant, in our case onto the deck.    Dad was surprised that the first one to do that didn't look like one of the biggest ones so he put it back.   Two more times it dropped off and started to crawl away, so finally he took it seriously and put it into a plexiglass box with some twigs.       This was on Monday.   It hung out on a twig and by yesterday morning looked like this (notice the threads holding it to the twig and the curved shape - click to biggify):

View from the other side -  Audrey in the background (this IS a FELINE blog, after all!):

A little snuggle with Dad:

By yesterday afternoon we had a second caterpillar on its way towards becoming a chrysalis - in the background of this picture:

If we can count right, there seem to be four who motored off when we were not looking overnight on Monday night.  There once were 18, now only 14.    Here is a really big one:

And now this is what the humans saw first thing this morning:     The chrysalis is the center of the picture, looks like a piece of the twig sticking out.  

Here it is with the picture cropped.     If you look really closely you can still see the segmented nature towards the left side.     Overnight it must have gone through a green stage of the chrysalis but we were not watching then.   

The second one has not yet, but has its curved shape and threads in evidence.     Maybe we will be able to see more of the transition during the day.

Looks like rain today so we will put the box in the garage.      The plan is to try and capture another two of them but to let the others go and make their chrysali wherever their instinct tells them.  Of course we will release the butterflies into the yard when they emerge,

Caterpillar Sizes

Audrey's first Mom gave us the great idea to use a tape measure to show the sizes of the caterpillars.   That sure made sense because in the pictures there is nothing to compare to except the size of the parsley leaves, which of course can be quite varied.    ( we did get Dad's finger in one picture a couple of days ago).

So here are a few pictures we took of different sized caterpillars while Dad held a tape measure next to them.    Pictures are from 4:30 pm on Saturday, so by the time this posts they will be bigger.  

We think this guy is the biggest of all of them:  there seemed to be several about 1 1/2 inches long, but he seemed the very longest.   

A slightly smaller one (sorry for the focus).

These next two must have hatched later than the biggest ones.     You can see this guy is not even 1 inch.

And THIS little fella is about 1/2 inch long.

Photo Hunt "Guess"

Kitties, in less than two days all the caterpillars have gotten a lot bigger.   We would say almost doubled in size?     So here is for your guess:    can you help us guess how much longer before one makes the first chrysalis?   We can't promise to know for sure when (give us a guess of which day next week), because they tend to crawl away from the plant to do it, and we suspect they will go under the deck or even further way, but if we can, we will try to catch it as it shows its desire to leave the plant.

We hope at least one will reach that stage before all the parsley is gone.  There are quite a lot of caterpillars on the plant.   And they eat a LOT!     (can you see the little caterpillar poopy behind the one on the right?)

Thursday in Our Garden

So we recently showed you the Black Swallowtail Mama Butterfly hanging out near our parsley.   They like parsley, carrot tops and dill.  

Behold the "babies":

(Dad brought the parsley plant onto the upper deck).  Here is the full plant.

Here is a BIG guy!

Not everybody hatched at the same time.  This fella is smaller.

Here is an even smaller one.

Dad's finger for comparison.

A year ago we had quite a few like this but they consumed the parsley before they were all fully grown. Then came the hurricane and ..................

We are sort of hoping the birds pick off just enough of them that the others have enough parsley to get to the chrysallis stage.   

AND,  our tomatoes are yielding real, edible fruits:  today Dad picked these:

Wordless Wednesday

Photo Hunt - Planter

When we saw the theme for this week's Phot Hunt we said "Oh, we can DEFINITELY do this one!"   Dad has 3 long window boxes of impatiens and also two round hanging pots.   Due to the painting project, they were all clustered together on the deck.      Simba inspects:  

Zooming out a bit you can see them all.   The ones in the window boxes have not grown as much as we think they usually do, but Dad has been protecting them from rain, hot sun, everything you can imagine, by keeping them close to the house, so maybe that is why.  

Wanting a REALLY nice picture with Simba in it, the humans moved the round pots to the top of the two small tables where Simba likes to rest (under them in the shade, on a towel).  

He did not cooperate.

Finally Friday

We have had a long almost two weeks.       The house has been being painted and although Dad is not doing it all himself, he has been very involved along with two other guys.  That measn we have not gotten the attention we have deserved.  Deck time has been very curtailed (though last week it was insanely hot and who wanted to be on the deck?)

A lot of napping going on around here in various places.    Here's Audrey on her favorite chair, but instead of her leg up on the arm of the chair, she adopted this position.   Now Mom knows she has gained weight on her thyroid medicine.  And whenever she picks her up she can feel the density of her bones and body - very compact!   But THIS picture exaggerates, my friends.  I am SURE it does!    F-tniss Everdine?

Friday Flutterby

We told you yesterday that Dad had seen a butterfly near the parsley.   Well, today he managed to get a picture.      Looks like she may be planning to lay eggs on the mint plant which is a bit confused, because what she really should do it lay them on the parsley, which is right adjacent to the mint.   We don't think these kind of caterpillars eat mint (they are black swallowtails.).  They do very well on parsley - a couple of years ago they completely stripped our parsley plant, unfortunately before they were fully grown.     But the year before we had several that formed the chrysalises and then hatched back into butterflies.   

Thursday in the Garden with Simba and Audrey

:::meow:::

So kitties, last Thursday I promised some pictures of our "gardening efforts".  

This first picture is what we WISH we could grow:   veggies and fruit the humans got at the Farmer's Market.   Yummy fresh stuff (for THEM!).

This is the Garden area of pots on our deck.     Tomatoes on the right, pepper plant in the middle and herbs on the left.

A closeup of a developing tomato - Dad says this plant is a "Better Boy" plant.  I thought I, Simba, was the Better Boy.

This plant is called Early Girl.  Like Audrey who wakes everybody up very early.

Here are the herbs:   basil and oregano on the left, mint and rosemary behind, parsley in front.  Dad grows the parsley for the butterflies - he saw a mama butterfly trying to lay eggs there yesterday so maybe we will see caterpillars soon.

Our Bee Balm plant is meant to attract hummingbirds but we still have not seen any.  One of Dad's freinds said he saw the first one in their garden a few days ago and they usually have more.     Something funny going on with the hummers this year it seems.

Audrey wanted to go out with Mom while she took the pictures.    The painter's tape on the door is because of painting going on outside this week.