Tuesday, November 8, 2011

New Pet? Or Not...

The last Friday in October I was taking out the garbage when I spotted a Wooly Bear Caterpillar on the cement. I actually wasn't sure if he was alive or not because he was pretty stiff and still (we later learned these caterpillars play dead when they are frightened). I still decided to bring it in for the girls to check out and get a closer look. Reagan was a little distraught over the thought it might be dead but after a bit she noticed it had uncurled and was beginning to move around. This caused great excitment in our house! The girls had a great time grabbing leaves off the deck for him to eat (we later learned caterpillars are very particular about what they eat) and Reagan even made a Lego house (I'm sure he appreciated the house tremendously).



A close-up of our Wooly Bear CaterpillarI was surprised how interested Jackson was in our fuzzy friend. I was honestly surprised Jackson noticed him at all. He was extremely interested in him, however, and watched him as intensely as the girls.One sad baby boy that I would'nt let him hold the caterpillar. Sometimes life just isn't fair!!!We decided to move our caterpillar to a Lego container so he wouldn't crawl off the paper plate when we weren't watching.By the time we moved him to the box we had researched and read what types of plants this specific caterpillar prefers to eat. The girls had a good time locating the plants in the yard and "feeding" them to our caterpillar.I'm not sure what he was doing here but he stayed positioned like this for quite a while. I don't know if he eventually dropped or climbed back up on the flower. We kept our Wooly Bear Caterpillar for 3-4 days but in the end decided to let him go. I would have loved to have kept him but we couldn't find enough information on food and hibernation let alone coming out of hibernation, cocoon and becoming an Isabella Tiger Moth. We're getting ready to do a lesson on hibernation so it would have been so amazing to watch an animal hibernate but I just wasn't sure of the environment to create. That said, after a few tears, we all decided it was best to let him go on a Maple tree, which is supposed to be one of his favorite leaves. We hope this little guy has a safe winter! :)

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