Wednesday, July 30, 2008

monarch caterpillar spinning silk


When I woke up this morning, I went to check on my caterpillars. Some had shed their skin and gone into the second instar. The two pictures above are of a monarch caterpillar that is in its second instar. One picture is 10x magnification and the other one is 60x magnification.




The video is of a monarch caterpillar spinning silk. It is in its first instar. They spin silk for self-defence and they spin silk to crawl easier.


This is a picture of a first instar monarch caterpillar with its egg. We have a dime for comparing the size of this caterpillar.


2 comments:

Grammy & Grampy said...

Very interesting video and pictures.
Grampy

Unknown said...

Grammy says that the crawling action reminds her of the way I crawl each night into the kitchen trying to reach my evening dark chocolate treat.
Gramps