The Very Cooperative Caterpillar

My son has been on a creepy-crawlies kick of late. Two weeks ago it was snails. We had three of them, living happily (I hope they were happy) in a little terrarium in various dark spaces around our house. We were reading books about snails, viewing websites about snails, spending hours on our bellies watching little snails in our terrarium hard at… work, I guess. They certainly munched the leaves we fed them. They came out and performed nicely every time we misted them with water. It’s quite clear that snails don’t like it dry.

By about day 10, however, I was beginning to worry that our snails were losing weight. So Kaman and I had a talk about it and he decided it was a good time to set the snails free. We watered our flower beds and sat their little home on its side so they could crawl away as they pleased. When we checked an hour or so later, one was perched on top the container. It was as if he was waiting to wave one last goodbye before he disappeared beneath the damp mulch in our shady front yard.

I thought Kaman might be a little bummed about the loss of his three pets, but later that evening I found him on his hands and knees, following a caterpillar across our porch. He began work immediately on a caterpillar habitat, after discussing with his sisters and I what a caterpillar would most want in a home. Turns out, he probably didn’t need to try so hard. That caterpillar marched himself right up to the top of the container and hung himself upside down. By bedtime, we could tell that he was wrapping himself into a tight little cocoon.

Kaman declared himself a hero, because that caterpillar was obviously just looking for a good, protected spot to do his metamorphosing. And for seven (or so) days, Kaman has faithfully peered into his little bug motel, and chatted with that chrysalis that’s doing nothing more than hanging there.

Today, however, a butterfly emerged. I think a bugologist (Kaman prefers that word to entomologist) has perhaps emerged with it.