The Naturalist

Earlier this fall, Mechanism pulled some little green caterpillars off my broccoli plants and saved them from my evil caterpillarcide rampage. He put them into a jar with some of the broccoli leaves and they lived on to form cocoons. Two of them actually turned into butterflies. We figured out that they are both females since they each have two dots on the forewing so alas they will not be having babies. He has been keeping them alive on sugar water in a giant plastic water jug. They looked a little weak this morning so we took them out and fed them in the dish garden. They immediately unrolled their little proboscises and started drinking. Here is the picture we took of them this morning.