Emergence

A few weeks ago, Zack found a wooly bear caterpillar outside and wanted to put it in his Bug Playground. We read up on how to care for wooly bears, and gave him grass and maple leaves. In a day or so, we couldn't find him. Turns out, he'd created a cocoon. I did a little more reading, and found out that we needed to put him in a cool place and that a moth would emerge in spring.

Tonight I just happened to look in the box as I was walking by, and saw a moth! So much for a long over-wintering! Given that he wasn't all beaten up as he would have been had he been trying to escape for a few days, I think he just emerged. He was a little groggy. Zack immediately agreed that we had to let him go outside, so we left him on the bench outside the back door. When I just looked, he was gone, hopefully flying freely.

We both agreed that we wouldn't have expected this kind of moth from a caterpillar colored like a wooly bear. This picture doesn't capture it well, but he was a lovely golden color.