Fun Facts Friday - What Am I?

I start out as an egg in batches of 10-100. After about 5-10 days I hatch from my egg and I’m called a larva or a caterpillar. I then eat continuously until one day I find the perfect twig and turn myself upside down. Here I will go into a resting stage (pupa) where my last skin is shed and I grow a tough outer shell.

What am I?

A (soon-to-be) Butterfly

All butterflies follow the same four stages of development;

1) Egg
2) Larva or Caterpillar
3) Pupa
4) Adult Butterfly

This process is call metamorphosis {meta-mor-pho-sis} and takes about 1 month to complete.

Curious about caterpillars? Here’s some more facts;

~ Once the caterpillar emerges from it’s egg it can (and will) eat many times its own weight in food.
~ Caterpillars protects themselves with various colours to blend in and wild decorative, striped or spotted bodies to make themselves look scary.
~ Caterpillars have poisonous, nettle-like hairs on their bodies to make them less tasty to predators
~ Some caterpillars give off an unpleasant smell

Here’s a fun way to remember the 4 stages of the butterfly. Sing these words to the tune of; The Farmer in the Dell

A butterfly has stages

been going on for ages

all starts with an egg

called meta-morph-o-sis,

Caterpillar comes out

and then begins to scout

looking for some tasty leaves,

he then begins to eat

Now it’s time to molt

shedding his old coat

another stage of his age

in metamorphosis

To rest it will go

so he can change and grow

the pupa’s come its almost done

the metamorphosis

The last stage is here

What will appear?

A butterfly to soar up high,

that’s metaaaa-morphhhh-ooooo-sis