To refresh (from 7th grade science class?), butterflies go through four stages: egg, larva (caterpillar), pupa (chrysalis), and adult butterfly.
Friend says: 8-14 days till he emerges. He is on Day 7 and the chrysalis is getting lumpier, pointier. I believe the wings are forming inside! I’ll report how in the next post.
Cool feature: you know when he’s about to hatch because the chrysalis turns black or clear. Then it’s about 48 hours. Can’t wait.
He or she? The gender story is complicated.
A friend told me how her young sons pick a caterpillar from a milkweed plant every year. They put it into a container with some milkweed leaves for sustenance, and mesh over the top.
Crazily, the next day, this guy crawled towards me as I sat on our steps. I texted my friend a photo; she confirmed this was indeed a monarch caterpillar.
No idea what he was thinking, there was no greenery whatsoever in the direction he was headed. I grabbed the only container I could find. Clearly, the Forces had sent him my way.
It wasn’t a great container, but I was in a rush, afraid a bird would grab him.
He didn’t like it in there too much. He curled into a sad lump despite my careful selection of soil with clover growing in it. My friend said I needed some milkweed leaves and a stick for him to hang off of to do his thing.
Sure enough, he sprung to action.
You can see this is basically the container you get sesame noodles in. Not roomy. How was I to move him to something larger without causing permanent mental damage to us both?
Turned out I didn’t have to move him. Because I saw him that evening hanging upside down from the twig, shaped like the letter “J.”
I wondered, what’s he doing in there, man? I should have stuck around…taken some video…because look what I awoke to the next morning. I know I can watch it on YouTube, but I could have seen it live for God’s sake. It’s astonishing.
As my friend put, “They are like babies being born — always seem to do it at midnight!”
I don’t know what the heck is going on inside that chrysalis, but will research and report in for you. Honestly, how does it HAPPEN? How does he coat his entire self with silk? For that one, watch the short, time-lapsed link above from Fish and Wildlife.
This is how we know there’s something greater than ourselves in the cosmos. Stay tuned.
Never seen it with a dangler bloom like this. I’m impressed!
The question is: will it open by Saturday night? Because it’s moving Sunday morning. Remember, it’s the NIGHT Blooming Cereus.
No way it’ll make the drive on Sunday intact. A new component to the nailbiter. My guess is Saturday is the night. But you just never know with NBC.
Alas, Night Blooming Cereus bud #2 shriveled and died.
The way this beauty is hanging bodes poorly, but we’ll see. There is a fragility in how the flowers are connected to the plant–they often fall off before blooming.
As usual, it’s a nail biter, folks.
It’s a miracle, children. A Flag Day miracle.
Thing never blooms this early.
You have to look hard.
I can’t tell if my Night Blooming Cereus has COVID Cabin Fever or if he’s trying to find his son across the street, but look at this baby go!
A week ago, we see him trying to bore through the ceiling.
Then he heads southwest, sensing a better way to make a break for it.
My guess: he wants to see his son, waving from across the street. I’ll have to ask my neighbor who owns him to do a drive-by at the window. The son is more mobile.
Which is exactly what the bloom viewing will have to be this year — drive-by — if we don’t get rid of this damned COVID!
It always makes me a little sad when I see a critter at the end of the season that might not make it through the suddenly-cold night. Sure, it’s nature and all that, but what about this little feller? That was it? That was his life?
…by Cereus or Son of Cereus, this gutsy little potato, totally unmonitored and uncared for, put on a show of his own.
There’s an I Dream of Jeannie bottle vibe to his photographic staging here. Ordinarily he lives, unobserved, in a forgotten window sill. He was happy for his moment in the spotlight. As are we all.
In the prior post, you see a gnarly Night Blooming Cereus, which had finally grown enough for me to make a serious cutting. In the interest of gifting a plant to a deserving NBC fan, I boldly took clippers to soon-to-be Father Cereus. It was a gross feeling. I did not follow internet instructions on rooting. I took the easy way dictated by maven Jeanne in Hanover.
Just look at him go! I’m so proud I could cry. He already sprouted his first leaf—as if a tiny hand, proudly raised high, waves, “Good-bye Mommy! Good-bye! I’m going to live with your favorite neighbor!”
(You know who you are.)
Sniff, sniff.
. . . must have used this slot for processing transactions, like payments for commissioned cave paintings and wooly mammoth chops.
Other ideas?
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