Posted in Science

Well we're not a 100% certain but we believe it'll be a moth.

We started with a little caterpillar that attracted our attention as he crawled across the kitchen floor.

The boys captured him and gave him lettuce leaves in hopes that he'd like them. 

He did.  The next morning he'd munched through most of it. 

But he'd left behind a mystery...what looked like eggs.  But caterpillars don't lay eggs.  There was sooo much of this stuff. 



We did a lot of research that led us to wonder whether the caterpillar had been infested by parasitic fly or wasp larvae...although he didn't look like an unwell caterpillar.

Of course we also spent a lot of time observing every part of him under the microscope. 

The next morning there was MORE of this stuff and it was at this point that we decided that it had to be caterpillar poo...more politely known as "frass". 

This little creature pooed mountains more than its body mass several times a day.  It was quite a job to keep its enclosure clean.  (For new homeschoolers, please note that "scooping up frass and other unmentionables" is an unwritten part of your new job description.  Just thought you ought to know ).

For several days we fed and cleaned up after our caterpillar wondering whether it might make a cocoon and do all those cool things we've only read about in butterfly books. 

One night he scared me half to death by leaving behind this big pile of black stuff.  Not his usual light greeny frass colour.  I thought the little fellow was in its dying moments.  

Under the microscope the black mass looked a lot like our caterpillar, right down to little hairs. 

I wondered whether it was its old skin which it had moulted.  But I didn't get long to ponder it.  Mr Catty as we have come to know him as (we apologise profusely Mr Catty if in fact you are a Mrs Catty) turned around and ate his old skin.  Hmmm...now I never learned about that gross fact in school. 

Sadly the boys missed this exciting moment.  It happened at midnight.  I was so tempted to wake both of the boys but thankfully I didn't as the "meal" only lasted a minute or so.

After this milestone, our caterpillar went right back to pigging out on lettuce.  He became obviously large.  Easily as large as his appetite.  I was wondering if I might need to take our shares in the lettuce industry.  Mr Catty had consumed nearly an entire lettuce head in his short stay.  Glad we weren't hosting a whole family!!

And then last week he stopped eating.  I was wondering where I failed in my insect parenting.  The boys of course were going to hold me solely responsible for his death.  (New homeschoolers please note:  You will take the blame for many critter deaths, and rightfully so in the case of putting critters in the freezer to slow them down for microscopic purposes, so fine tune your grave digging skills...yes, another rarely mentioned role of the homeschooling mum).

He continued on his starvation diet for several days and just acted odd.  He roamed up and down his enclosure almost like he was looking for something.  We added a twig or two wondering whether he needed something to attach to to make his cocoon.  But no, he didn't seem to like our twig at all and just kept on roaming aimlessly.

I figured the end was really close when he started rolling over on his back.   I had his little grave site pre-selected and then one night on my way to bed I saw it.  A pupa...lying on the bottom of the enclosure, next to a moulted skin.  Wow!  Oh yes, I wanted to wake the boys again.  Why does the exciting stuff happen around midnight?!  But I thought better of it since he would still be a pupa the next day.


And he was.  What surprised us was that he continues to move around in his cocoon.  He responds to movement and wriggles around when you open his enclosure.  He also just rolls around happily during the day.  We're wondering whether it's a necessary part of being a cocoon on the ground.


We think he may turn into a moth if we manage to provide the necessary things for this change to happen and don't harm the process in some unknowing way.   After a little research it seems that butterflies more commonly make their cocoon on a branch or twig whereas moth are more likely to lie under leaves or soil on the ground.  At least that's the information we've uncovered at this point.  Do share more if you can enlighten us further.

So we're in a holding pattern waiting to see what our intriguing visitor will or won't do next. 

We'll keep you informed of Mr Catty's progress.