Before a monarch becomes a butterfly, it is a real-life, very hungry caterpillar. Unlike the caterpillar in Eric Carle’s famous picture book, monarch caterpillars do not eat strawberries, chocolate cake, or Swiss cheese. These caterpillars will only eat the leaves, stems, and seed pods of milkweed and butterfly weed plants. Monarch butterflies lay their eggs on these host plants so when caterpillars hatch, they have food immediately available.
Monarch butterflies have four different life stages. First, it is an egg. A monarch egg is about the size of a pencil tip and can be off-white or yellow in color. The egg hatches about five days after it is laid. Being a caterpillar is stage two. For the next two weeks, the tiny caterpillar that hatches spends all its time eating,…
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Fun For Kidz (Digital) - 1 Issue, Bugged