Animal of the Week: Monarch Butterfly

Monarch butterflies are just coming out in this area. They are large orange butterflies with black markings. The one pictured above is a male - you can see the two spots on his hind wings.

For some basic biology on butterflies, check out a previous post here.

Monarch butterflies have a long distance migration where they spend the winter in Mexico.

Milkweed is the Monarch's host plant - that means that as caterpillars, they eat only milkweed. This makes them taste bitter which is why they have such bright coloration. This bright coloration tells birds - Don't eat me, I taste bad!

There will be lots more butterfly fun all week - so keep coming back!

Fun Friday Fact

Butterflies taste with their feet.

Really! They have taste receptors on their feet so when they land on a flower, they can tell if will be delicious.

Animal of the Week - butterflies

I saw my first Spring Azure this past weekend. So butterfly season is upon us!

Butterflies are insects - that means they have three body parts, six legs and wings as adults. They have an exoskeleton and that means their skeleton is on the outside.

Butterflies have a complete metamorphosis (remember that is the science word for change) going from an egg to a larvae (caterpillar) to a chrysalis and finally to an adult butterfly.

Butterflies eat nectar as adults. They have a long proboscis (tongue) that is hollow. They slurp up the nectar from plants. As larvae they also eat plants but as babies they eat the leaves of plants.

Butterflies can fly as fast as 12 miles per hour. While that may be faster than I can run, the fastest human being can run about 22 miles per hour.

Butterfly Origami for prechoolers

I love origami and doing it with young kids can be quite a test of patience for everyone. I found this lovely simple butterfly a few years ago. I've used with kids as young as three and they have been quite successful at it.

Rather than recreate a wonderful tutorial, I am going to point you to it here.

This butterfly is symmetrical and could be colored like a real butterfly.