Egg Box Caterpillars

We have recently been studying the life cycles of caterpillars and have had a caterpillar in an insect tank in the house for the children to watch. Everyday it was cared for and given new leaves to eat and we were eagerly watching for the first signs of a transformation. All efforts  were rewarded early one morning when it started to shed it's caterpillar skin, after much wriggling the pupa below was free and once exposed it changed colour to a very dark brown.

The shed skin with all it's caterpillar features can clearly be seen in the photograph above. We have kept the skin to study under the digital microscope and the pupa has been put in a safe and quiet place to continue with it's transformation. The children have enjoyed this life cycle study and have also been watching cinnabar caterpillars on the ragwort outside. Last year we studied the life cycle of frogs and pond ecology and we had tadpoles in a tank on the kitchen table.

The children have also been doing some caterpillar related junk modelling with egg boxes, as you can see above we have cut the egg box in half, keeping a long row to resemble a caterpillar. This has then been painted and decorated along with some other critters and left to dry.

After the paint had dried some pipe cleaner legs, antenna and googly eyes where added to complete the caterpillar look.

These are the finished caterpillars... colourful little critters, don't you think?

The children will be closely watching the status of all the pupae we have, for any signs of hatching as we are hoping to film the process if it happens during the day and will let you know how that turns out.

Quick July Update.

It has been so busy here lately, we have had three birthdays and an anniversary, I have had two assignments to do and my eldest daughter has spread her wings and moved away from home. On top of all this it has been two months now since my cat went missing and my blog had it's first anniversary, which I missed. So posts here have not been very frequent, just the odd celebration post but we have been doing things... honestly.

At the start of the summer we made the most wonderfully tasting elderflower cordial, it kept us going for a while and the children loved it so much. The taste of this will forever remind me of the start of summer, my daughter affectionately named it 'flower juice'. Details of how this was made is on my husband's blog. He has also started off some more wine, last year we made some amazing wines, I'm hoping he can recreate these again this year. He has written about the wine in the post after the one above in case you fancy a read.

The allotment and the vegetables that we grow in the garden have really taken off, in fact last year I thought I had a glut of courgettes but that was nothing compared to this year! Everything I have cooked has included courgette and I do mean everything... courgettes are coming out of our ears. Of course I have made more courgette relish as seen in the above photograph, only this time I made a double batch of the one from last year. This year the relish tastes even better which is good as I may be forced to make another batch.

Must introduce you to one of our newest family members, this is one of our giant African land snails, we have had them for a few weeks now and they have amazed us with their antics and have doubled in size. My daughter loves snails and is constantly watching them as they bury themselves and munch their food... very loudly. We also have some stick insect eggs, my son is avidly waiting for them to hatch so that he can study them, as well as the pupating caterpillars. We will keep you informed of progress in the mini zoo.

You may have noticed the two blog awards in the side bar, I was given these at the end of June and I still haven't got around to thanking those responsible and passing them on. Watch this space though I will get to them shortly and everything else I may have missed out.

off to the woods

   On Friday, we visited the woods, thinking it would be cooler in the shade of all those tall, leafy trees. We went to the woodland that was closest to the spot where we had previously found the baby grass snakes, dead in the road. My son was hoping to spot some more in the undergrowth alive this time, so that he could watch their natural movements and take photographs, but it was not to be.

   

    It was quite eerie as it was a new wood to us and quite dense in places. My son was convinced that we would become lost forever... continuously going round in circles, but we managed to find our way home again. We spotted many creatures and traces that they had been there before us with the binoculars and magnifying glass. As you can see my daughter has the philosophy, "examine ALL things closely"

     We saw these strange looking black and yellow caterpillars on the ragwort in a sunny clearing, which appeared to jump if we got too close to them. They are the larva of the cinnabar moth which we spotted nearby too.

     My son just loved running up and down the hills, and didn't mind too much that we didn't find any snakes this time. Maybe next time...

     All todays photographs were taken by my husband (found here) on location in the dark, scary woods!