Category: Special days

Chrysalises Galore!

Holding a caterpillar

Beginning moltingYesterday, six caterpillars made their chrysalises!  Today, just one did.  We onlyMolting still have one caterpillar left!

My friend, Thomas and mom and sister Sarah, came over to watch them make their chrysalises.  We played outside, played inside and watched them make their chrysalises.

We learned a few things;

  • Caterpillars act like an accordion before they make their chrysalises
  • When they molt before turning into chrysalises they look like they have a really bigCaterpillars Hanging brain
  • It looks like their skin splits as they molt
  • It is only a matter of minutes to molt and change into chrysalises
  • They take different amounts of time to molt
  • The newest ones will probably “hatch” Thursday or Friday.
  • Eating and Faster may emerge on Sunday–ohhhh 🙁
  • Our last one is roaming
  • They can form their chrysalis wherever; some are on leaves, some on coffee filters and some on the glass! Our chrysalises

We have questions

  • Do you know if they are attached to the side, will they survive?
  • Will they turn into caterpillars in the same order as they formed chrysalises?
  • Will I be able to raise Luna Moths next year?
  • Do you think it would be fun to raise Monarchs?

Today is Sarah’s Birthday.  She is eleven!  Happy Birthday Sarah!

A Miracle!

Our caterpillars eat lots!On 22 August we moved the Peanut Butter, the Hatchery, and the Nursery caterpillars to the clean cage.  We put the Blue Lid Caterpillars into the Nursery.

The caterpillars in the cage eat and eat and eat and eat!  We kept going to get milkweed!  The night before emerging.They ate it all again.  Then in the night we had to get some!  Then in the morning we had to get some more! ):

Just before emerging.Saturday night we were worried that our butterfly might not make it, cause her chrysalis was turning black.  We could sort of see through it though, so we did not know.

On Sunday morning before church we watched the first butterfly emerge!  I missed it up to her head coming out.  Then I watched her pump up her wings.   We went to church.Wings are dry

Just out!

Pumping up wings

When we got home, she was drying out her wings.  She did not want to eat.  We broughtButterfly her outside and she flittered away!

I didn’t want to let her go.  We worked so hard to raise.  We let her go so she could migrate to Mexico.  I want to go to Mexico when it is winter here.  So I can see if we can go to see lots of monarchs hibernate in big big big BIG groups!My butterfly

Caterpillar News break

Our big caterpillar is in his chrysalis.  This morning he was hanging in a j-shape on a milk weed.  He glued himself on.

Then he started making his chrysalis this afternoon.  From what all I saw, he was partly done and shaking.  It looked like a green bag with golden dots on the bottom.  It went from the bottom of him to the top of him.  It looked like he was getting into the bag by jumping in.  The top half you could still see his stripes!

We could not take pictures of him working because we could not get the camera to focus through his cage.  Momma said we did not want to knock him off.  I think he looks like a Christmas tree ornament.  Momma says he is Newly made chrysalissmaller than she thought he would be.

Next we will wait until tonight to move him somewhere.  Where do we put him?  I don’t know!  He will stay there about 2 weeks until it is time to get out!

I like taking care of my caterpillars but it is hard work.  It would be easier if they were in a different kind of cage, I don’t know what kind.

Now I just have to be patient for when he hatches.

Monarch Day Care continued

Upside down caterpillar

Newly hatched caterpillars

Today (12 August) we found three newly hatched caterpillars!  They are about 2 mm long.  Two of them were still eating their egg cases.  We put two of them in the butterfly rearing container.  One egg looks like it is going to be hatching soon.

🙂

  • Cage; Still EATING MACHINE!  Cleaned out frass.  It is green!  “Looks like bunny scat”,  Audrey says.   Trouble measuring, estimated 5 cm (2 inches).
  • Blue lid container; the caterpillar is still 9 mm.
  • Peanut butter container; gave fresh leaf.  Caterpillar is 11 mm. “Little poop is cutie because it’s just baby caterpillar”, Audrey again!
  • “The Hatchery”; down to 2 white eggs and we are questioning if the dark one is an egg or not.
  • Butterfly rearing container; still has one egg.  Added 2 newly hatched caterpillars from the Hatchery.
  • New Nursery!; Moved one caterpillar egg and one caterpillar from the Hatchery.

CaterpillarThank you Audrey for volunteering to help Momma measure the caterpillars and clean and feed them! 🙂
We will keep you updated.

Monarch Day Care

My caterpillar drawing

We are raising Monarchs.  I have been wanting to do that for a LOONNGG time.

Monarch EggNow I have lots of caterpillars and eggs–mostly eggs.   On Thursday, 7 August, we saw out of our window, a Monarch laying eggs on some milkweed around 1:30.

On Friday, we collected two eggs.  We snipped off some of the milkweed leaves and we also learned two caterpillars there and got them.  We put them in airtight containers with milkweed leaves.

Saturday one egg hatched!  We also washed out their frass (caterpillar scat).Caterpillar’s home

We had four containers on Saturday.

  • Blue lid container the caterpillar is .5 cm.
  • Peanut butter container the caterpillar is .5+ cm.  (I don’t have an accurate ruler)
  • “The Hatchery” has one egg with a black spot.  We think it is a head, it means it will be hatching soon.
  • Butterfly rearing container has one egg.

On Sunday we found 5 caterpillar eggs at church and four more in a field near our house.  We put them in The Hatchery.  We also found one large caterpillar near pupation stage, probably 1 to 1 1/2 inches long.

We put some milkweed in the refrigerator for caterpillar food later.  We fed the caterpillars Caterpilllar eatingfresh milkweed and cleaned out the frass.

Today’s– Monday– stats.  I have an accurate ruler now 🙂

  • Got new cage for big caterpillar.  He is 4.5 cm long.  Eats one leaf in one night!  He is eating another leaf.  He is a EATING MACHINE!
  • Blue lid container the caterpillar is .9 cm.   Color is darker than before.
  • Peanut butter container the caterpillar is .8 cm and fat!
  • “The Hatchery” has one egg with a black spot and 6 white eggs.
  • Butterfly rearing container has one egg.  I think we have a new caterpillar but I am not sure.  We can’t find the caterpillar but we think we see frass on the bottom.

Eating MachineI know that Monarchs are in their eggs 3 to 5 days.  Then they are caterpillars for two weeks and grow to about 5 cm.  They make a chrysalis and turn into a butterfly!  Then they will live different lengthsMonarch Caterpillar on milkweed leaf of time.   Monarchs go down to Mexico or Lower California in fall.

I will keep you updated!

Andrea has a blog about what she is learning too.   She is doing a very good job!

Catching up!

At the fair we did lots of fun, fun, fun things.  Otherwise known as FUUUUUNNNNN!

We walked, we ate, we looked at animals.  We also looked at the commercial buildings and the exhibit buildings.“What’s going on here?”

Jumping hurdles

 

Family Picture

My favorite thing was the tiger show.   We learned that the White Bengal Tiger does not live in the snow.  They are rare because you need two recessive genes (the white ones) because if you have one white and one yellow, you will have yellow!  If you have two yellows (the dominate genes) you will definately get yellow!  At least that is how I understand it.

We found my pictures and a candle that I made in the exhibit buildings.  The candle earned a green ribbon because we got it in late.   The other ones did a good job.  They both got into the one that the winners are picked out of.  The black and white one got Reserve Champion.  I felt “yeah!” and I was surprised.  Very Surprised!   I am going to try the same categories next year.  Also I want to do models, but I don’t know if I will do one.“Capturing Memories”My patio candle

“Experiences in Color”Dinner time!

The tent I shared with a friendThen Wednesday of that week, I went to Webelo Camp.  Daddy came with me.  He was one of the leaders.

I went boating, swimming, worked with pullies, made a catapult–that works!  Daddy got to do everything I did if he wanted to.Trojans preparing to fight!

The last day we had a great big water fight!  We were pretending that we were in a war against the leaders (the Greeks) .  We were the Trojans!  The Trojans won, that does not go along with History 🙂

My Leaders

We did a skit.  Four people were pretending to ride on a bus.  Four people walk up.  “What are you doing?”

“Riding on the invisible bus”What are you doing?

“Where are you going?”

“Camp”

“Can we go too?”

“Sure”

Now there are eight people riding on the bus.  This happens two more times the exact same way.  Then three more people come up.

“What are you doing?”

“Riding on the invisible bus”

“Oh, that one went for repairs yesterday!”

“Which shop?”Oh, that one went for repairs yesterday!

And all the boys who were riding the invisible bus fell down!

“Oh, that one!”

I liked the play.  It was fun(ny) 🙂 !

I hope Daddy and I can go to camp again next year!

New Blog

Andrea has a blog now!  It is here.

She gets one because she is in first grade.  That is when Momma lets us have a blog.

Andrea is going to dictate to Momma what she wants written on her blog.  And I’m –whether I like it or not–will start writing more by myself.   :(   Momma says I have to write more by myself because I am getting older.

Andrea’s blog is not perfect yet, so you can watch it change!

This is what we found as my first blog!  We thought it used to say “Momma held a snake at Nature Nuts.”

The rest of the story is Andrea and I did not want to hold a snake and Momma told us if we held the snake, she would hold the snake.  Momma was thinking “ewww…disgusting”.  She did not think we would do it.  But we held them!

The snakes we held were born at the Naturalist Office and there were at least twelve.  Momma thinks there were 30 something.  Andrea’s snake kept trying to escape, quite the whippyier.  Momma got another one that was not quiet so fast.

A Better Brief on My Test

All I remember about decided to study for my amateur radio test, is sitting on the couch, reading a library book. The book was the ham radio one, I don’t quite remember why it made me excited, but I do remember starting the class the beginning of May.

How I learned about my test was reading the radio book, and writing down the answers–I am surprised I did not get writers cramp because I was part of a class. (Grandpa offered to take me to the class and got the book for me). I think there were 5 people besides me in class.  all of them where older.

The class itself was tell the answers of the questions that were asked in a notebook that the teacher gave me. I thought for the homework if I didn’t have Momma to help me, I would DEFINITELY get writers cramp. I just read the book if we didn’t do the homework. I could answer most of the questions by memory when the teacher asked the questions.

The test was sort of easy once I understood what it would be like. The real test was different than the practice tests I got at home. It was set up differently and the orange paper threw me off the most.

I was really nervous taking my test, so thank you for praying for me. It helped me a lot.

I did not pass it on the first try. When I did not pass it on the first try I felt bad. I missed it by one–which made matters worse. I knew I could retake it then but I still felt sad.

The second time I passed it and then I tried the General Class test. I got half of the General questions right. It was not enough to pass. But I did better than Momma!

Now I am waiting for my call sign. It’s kind of like my name and it helps identify where you got your license from, but not where you are.

Depending if I use a base station or a hand held radio, I can talk around the world on the radio!

Here are three of the questions I needed to know. Do you know the answers to them?

🙂

What is the term used to describe opposition to current flow in ordinary conductors such as wires?
A. Inductance
B. Resistance
C. Counter EMF
D. Magnetism

8)

What formula is used to calculate resistance in a circuit?
A. Resistance (R) equals voltage (E) multiplied by current (I)
B. Resistance (R) equals voltage (E) divided by current (I)
C. Resistance (R) equals voltage (E) added to current (I)
D. Resistance (R) equals voltage (E) minus current (I)

😉

What is the resistance of a circuit when a current of 3 amperes flows through a resistor connected to 90 volts?
A. 3 ohms
B. 30 ohms
C. 93 ohms
D. 270 ohms