Watch us Grow!

Back to 4th grade page

Photos and Facts

Like all butterflies, monarchs undergo a metamorphosis Our class was fortunate to witness this amazing event!

We started with 7 newly hatched caterpillars (they come from teeny eggs). After about two weeks of dining on nothing but milkweed our caterpillars sheds their exoskeleton and emerged as a beautiful jade green chrysalis. The most interesting thing about their chrysalis was the appearance of a gold-like thread wrapped around certain random places on the hardening chrysalis.  Once inside their new 'skin' many changes were taking place. It took nearly 2 weeks when finally our chubby, hungry caterpillar emerged from its chrysalis into a beautiful, winged monarch butterfly.
Mrs. Merli was the best butterfly mom. She went out into a field to gather fresh Milkweed, changed their enclosures, made sure they were always safe and even visited them on weekends to make sure they were all doing okay.
We said goodbye and let them go one by one. We did some research and found out that Four to five generations of North American monarchs hatch each spring and summer. Most live only two to five weeks, but the last generation (ours) of the summer lives six to seven months  It was our generation that is making  the long migration to Mexico.