Our friends the beasts

[accykeef]

Many people view caterpillars as pests in their garden but here at Keefy Towers, we love 'em. The Reluctant Hiker is mad keen on all things bug like and we, as her servants do all we can to encourage the little creatures to eat our plants.

These nasturtiums have thrived this year and started out as a few scattered seeds. By July, they were flourishing.


By August, they were attempting to hide the compost bin.


Nasturtiums are related to the cabbage family and attract butterflies.

They are used by many veg growers as sacrificial plants. For the second year running, ours have attracted the attentions of several Cabbage White butterflies and having laid their eggs, we are now seeing the fruits of their labours. This clutch of caterpillars has so far escaped the attentions of our local bird population.








We have brought some of them inside and put them in this old sweet jar and now we are waiting for the next stage. We think the eggs were laid early August so the butterflies should be flying around our dining room, sometime in September.


We await further developments.

[trevnhil]

Those are very nice pictures of your caterpillars Keith. But I am not sure that I would trust them not to eat everything in sight. Maybe if you get too many they could be cooked.

Anyway as long as they are welcomed by your family then I would wish them no harm. They certainly look beautiful.

Regards. Trev..

PS... as a 'Mod' could you delete Peters mistaken post on Trev in Cyprus please.

Cheers. Trev..

[accykeef]

The caterpillars are getting much bigger now and are getting ready to change into their crysalis stage. I am hoping to capture some of them as they emerge as butterflies but that will be purely down to chance.

[accykeef]

The first one has started the slow process of changing ino a crysalis. The first stage is to secrete a clear liquid and spin a very fine silk thread around it's body. The silk absorbs the liquid and then it dries out. It is naures equivalent of fibre glass and resin.


After a couple of days drying out, the caterpillar has morphed into a crysalis and the next stage of it's life begins.


OK kids, here is a quiz for you.
Do you know how a caterpillar breathes?

[trevnhil]

That's very informative Keith, and the pictures are very good and clear indeed. I haven't got the answer to your children's question although I could perhaps use Google.

Another question comes to mind. How long are they in this form before they become Butterflies? It seems the wrong time of year to me, I thought it would have all happened earlier in the Summer.

Trev..

[accykeef]

You were up early this morning Trev!

They are usually in this state for about 7 days although if the temperature is too low they delay their butterfly stage, isn't nature marvelous.

You are right when you say they are late this year but rhere are still caterpillars on the nasturtiums so we are not upsetting nature too much. The dilema now is where to put them, leave them inside and they will emerge but may not survive when we let them go.
I could put them in the garage but if they emerge there then they will almost certainly end up a victim of one of the spiders which lives in there.

The web in the window is owned by a mean brown spider machine called jaws. It is a big un but is becoming rather shy these days. I have tried to take a photo a few times but it just runs off. Of course, The Reluctant Hiker wants to capture it and keep it in a jar but that is not allowed. She would almost certainly let it escape in the house and that would cause more problems.



I have been looking round for a suitable box to put the caterpilars in, which we could leave outside. There are some butterfly houses around but I want to be able to photograph them through their various stages. I have designed one although I need to make a few changes for the design to be practical.


The top and front are going to be perspex and the left hand side will be louvered to allow the butterflies to escape. A slide in mesh screen will cover the louvres until the caterpillars have gone into their crysalis state otherwise we will have no caterpillars to watch.
It is a bit late in the season for it now but I think it will be made over the winter. I have a thought in the bak of my mind that the top could be a bird table but we will have to see.

[trevnhil]

That's an interesting design Keith, and should work well. I hope we will be able to follow it's construction via photographs.

Trev..