Raising Butterflies

We have been raising and releasing Monarch and Eastern Black Swallowtail butterflies at school for 4 seasons. This season we were awarded a grant through Michigan State University to expand a food garden to our outdoor classroom. We combined our butterfly garden with our vegetable garden so we can increase pollinators including butterflies.

Our new butterfly house held 40 Eastern Black Swallowtail butterflies, and 20 Monarch Butterflies. Though our numbers were down for Monarch, we will increase our common Milkweed patch and native flowers for next season to help with the Monarch conservation efforts.

Female 4th generation Monarch that will migrate to Mexico for the winter

One of our favorite books to read to our students is “Señorita Mariposa” by Ben Gundersheimer. This book is in English and Spanish and is beautifully illustrated and well written. Link here for the book: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1524740705/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_JAP3Y12Y5Q14BFWWJ2HP?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

When introducing butterflies to preschoolers, remember to prepare a few lesson plans other than the lifecycle. We enjoy looking for eggs on milkweed, watching the caterpillars grow into their instars, talk about molting, using proper terminology such as chrysalis, instar, eclose, (not enclose), and migrate.

We also took scales off of the abdomen of newly eclosed Monarch to test for OE under a microscope. Since we only collect eggs and rear them in our butterfly house, we had zero cases of OE. Find out more information about OE here: https://youtu.be/pxXkAL1h2pw

Señorita Mariposa

After learning about butterflies from youtube, books, and online groups you will be ready to create your butterfly garden and maybe a butterfly house. Please do not use small pop up tents. Rest cloud makes amazing tents for butterflies if you are not ready for a huge house yet. Please purchase a larger one. It is important that butterflies have room to hang so they can pump fluid into their wings. Here is the link: https://a.co/d/0hAOI7j

Eastern Black swallowtail caterpillars