As I’ve learned more about the life cycle of butterflies (thank you Wild Kratts and children’s picture books) I am more and more amazed. When I was creating the basic idea for the Average Josie logo Mr. Average mentioned that he liked one particular image because it looked like a butterfly. I reflected on what I had learned about a butterfly and decided it would be a great representation of what we promote here.
A monarch caterpillar starts as a tiny, minuscule egg. Within the eggs you can actually see the itty bitty caterpillar waiting to hatch. Incredible right? Inside an egg- the size of a pinhead!- you can actually see the caterpillar! Once hatched it grows from a minute squirmy wormy to a ginormous 2″ long caterpillar. More than 100 times it’s original size! Everyday it works to eat enough milkweed to grow, molting 4-5 times as it grows too big for its skin. It literally sheds the old as it continues it’s journey to fulfill destiny.
Once large enough it will attach itself by the tail end to a small “silk-button” connected to a branch, a twig, an old tire, a wheelbarrow or a mason jar lid, and begin to build its chrysalis. This is where the mighty change happens.
When I was little we would visit my Great Grandparents and wile away our afternoons playing in the yard, walking to the ice cream shop, daydreaming with cousins, and collecting monarch caterpillars. Much to my parents chagrin (I’m sure) we would collect caterpillars with enough milkweed to feed them for years, show our prize to Grandma who would dutifully collect mason jars and lids and proceed to poke holes in the lid to allow our new pets to breathe. We would transplant our new “family member” to their glass residence and excitedly take them home and watch them eat, connect to the lid, spin their chrysalis and eventually, miraculously, emerge as a beautiful butterfly. (Apparently you can now do this even if your Grandparents don’t live by milkweed fields.)
This pupa stage can last anywhere from a couple weeks to a couple years for some butterflies!! Inside this very average covering the once caterpillar goes through such a dramatic change that you must go to a cellular level to find its caterpillar origins. The caterpillar’s body is broken down from it’s own digestive juices (blegh! That’s worse than “moist!”) and organs that were hidden below the surface without any function now develop in full force to create a new organism. In its beginnings the chrysalis is actually a “little bag filled with rich fluid”. The caterpillar actually disintegrates into goo. In this environment unbelievable change occurs. So unbelievable that the caterpillar is hardly recognizable when it emerges as a butterfly. As it slowly climbs out of its metamorphic home it perches and waits as its wings expand, pumping fluid and life through its new body.
It stretches its wings and lets them dry and harden before taking flight. It now eats nectar from flowers, having lost it’s mouth and replacing it with a straw-like proboscis. It’s whole existence has taken on new experiences and purpose. I still look at a butterfly in awe of it’s creation and beauty.
The monarch caterpillar, at first glance, is just a caterpillar. Nothing really remarkable. But to think that it actually grows 100 times it’s size in the space of 2 weeks is anything but ordinary. That growth happens day by day, hour by hour, leaf by leaf, nibble by nibble.The chrysalis hangs silently, hoping to blend into he background, to remain unnoticed and undisturbed. And in the midst of its hanging, miraculous things are happening! If we could look inside the chrysalis we’d see it’s messy, chaotic, unrecognizable, but full of good, necessary and remarkable things. And that is why I hope to offer. I want to help take our normal, everyday, “munching away on milkweed” tasks, and be able to see through to goo (figurative and literal), the chaos, and remember the extraordinary is happening all around us, right here, right now. Our whole existence will take on new perspective and purpose. Everyday we accomplish the remarkable, everyday there is something extraordinary to behold.
Information gathered from www.ansp.org, www.flightofthebutterflies.com, and www.sciencing.com
Image of life cycle from www.dkfindout.com
Image 1:tiny, by smalljude at flickr.com; Some rights reserved, see license for more information;
Image 2: Monarch Life Cycle – 17 of 20, by Sid Mosdell at flickr.com; Some rights reserved, see license for more information; Image size reduced by averagejosie.com
Image 3: Monarch Life Cycle – 20 of 20, by Sid Mosdell at flickr.com; Some rights reserved, see license for more information; Image size reduced by averagejosie.com.
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