The egg Skip brought home from the golf course last Thursday finally hatched last night. Just before that, we saw the black dot at the tip of the egg so we knew hatching was imminent.
We were starting to wonder if the egg was a dud as it had been 4 days which is the maximum amount of time for the egg state. Perhaps having the air-conditioning on during this heat wave slowed the process down a bit.
This morning it's about 3mm long (1/8") and should double in size every day until it pupates (forms the chrysalis) in a couple of weeks.
I found two more eggs on our milkweed yesterday and am thinking of devising some kind of covering/protection for that part of the plant so the leaf can stay on the plant outside. That way the larvae can continue munching away on their 'birth' plants (not scientific terminology). We have a trip coming up in a couple of weekends and it would be nice if the larvae can thrive on their own in the protected wild.
This is the 12th year that I've raised monarchs. For those of you who are new to my blog, I have done posts about most of the activity here over the years since 2007. You can check my archives at the right by clicking on the year, then month (mostly July and August)OR do a search in the search window at top of the right sidebar on this post. Terms could include: monarchs, larva(e), pupa(e), chrysalis, etc.
I'm not sure I'll be able to top the 74 monarchs I raised and released last year but it's worth a good try.
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