A Caterpillar Castle
Zola C. and Kensleigh S. – 3rd Graders at Sally Ride Elementary
Building a Habitat for Monarchs
Kensleigh and Zola with their completed Critter Comfort Cottage.
Our design has two chambers because older instars can accidentally eat smaller instars, so we built it this way to help prevent this from happening. The first chamber holds eggs and first and second instars. Once they reach the third instar we will move them to the second chamber, where they can grow into the fourth and fifth instar then chrysalis, where they complete their metamorphosis into a butterfly. We made it big enough so that we can put the milkweed into the habitat. We have milkweed in the habitat to feed the caterpillars. The caterpillars eat a lot which means they also poop a lot. So we put in poop trays so that you can easily take it out, clean it and put it back in. Chamber 1 has a rain cover to help stop rain and flooding from coming into the habitat because the baby caterpillars could drown. Chamber 2 has a plastic lid for chrysalis making on the ceiling.
We worked together to build plastic cup towers to keep the net up and stop it from falling. We used duck tape to tape the cups together. Then we used Velcro to keep the net up on the cup towers. We used several recycled items in our creation including a plastic container lid used as a base, plastic deli trays used as the poop catchers, and a plastic deli lid used for chrysalis, and an amazon bubble mailer for the rain protector.
Research and Design Planning
Chamber 2 (on the left in the image above) will house older instars, stage 3, 4, and 5, including the chrysalis and adulthood butterfly stage.
Once they emerge as a butterfly they will be released.
List of Works Cited/Used in Research
- Graham, Caleb. Monarchs on the Move. Houghton Mifflin Publishing, 2006.
- Why I raise monarch butterflies. Triangle Gardener Magazine. (2020, June 17). Retrieved November 23, 2021, from https://www.trianglegardener.com/why-i-raise-monarch-butterflies/
- Science for kids: Raising Butterflies. Wholesome Children. (2021, April 11). Retrieved November 23, 2021, from https://wholesomechildren.com/raising-butterflies/
- NAPPC Monarch Taskforce, the Monarch Joint Venture, and the association of State Departments of Transportation involved in the Monarch Highway. “Monarch Highway | The Monarch Joint Venture.” The Monarch Joint Venture, Retrieved November 23, 2021, https://monarchjointventure.org/get-involved/i-am-a/department-of-transportation/monarch-highway.
- “Western Monarch Population Closer to Extinction as the Wait Continues for Monarchs’ Protection Under the Endangered Species Act | Xerces Society.” The Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, Graph Retrieved November 23, 2021, https://xerces.org/blog/western-monarch-population-closer-to-extinction-as-wait-continues-for-monarchs-protection.
Cottage Construction and Design Documentation
We worked together to build the Monarch habitat on November 23, 2021 following our drawn design plan. We used the materials listed below.
Habitat Features – Close-Ups
Recycled trays were used as poop catchers. The tray can be easily removed for cleaning.
Instars can form their chrysalis on the plastic lid on ceiling.
Foreground- Chrysalis already formed
Background- Instar beginning to form chrysalis
Instars eat milkweed plants. We built the habitat big enough to insert an entire potted plant!
Top Right- recycled Amazon bubble mailer prevents rain from collecting in the habitat and drowning young instars.
Critter Test – Caring For Instars
Project Log- Critter Test Observations
| Date | 1st Chamber Observations | 2nd Chamber Observations |
| November 23, 2021 | Instar ‘A’ – 3/4 cm in length, stage 1 Egg was observed on a leaf  | Instar ‘B’ – 4 cm in length, stage 5 |
| November 28, 2021 | Instar ‘A’ – 1 1/2 cm in length Instar ‘C’ – newborn 1/2 cm – egg had hatched! | Instar ‘B’ – bright green chrysalis formed on leaf |
| December 2, 2021 | Instar ‘A’ – 2 1/2 cm in length Instar ‘C’ – 1 cm in length (doubled in size!)  | Instar ‘B’ – leaf that chrysalis was on wilted so we taped it on the plastic lid. |
| December 4, 2021 | Instar ‘A’ – 3 cm in length –> moved to Chamber 2 Instar ‘C’ – 2 cm in length (doubled in size again!)  | Instar ‘B’ – still a chrysalis Instar ‘A’ had molted and was moved to Chamber 2.  |
| December 7, 2021 | Instar ‘C’ – 3 cm —> moved to Chamber 2 | ‘A’ – bright green chrysalis ‘B’ – dark green chrysalis  |
| December 9, 2021 | No more instars in chamber 1. | ‘A’ – darker green chrysalis ‘B’ – chrysalis clear and empty, butterfly emerged and was released Instar ‘C’ – made “J” shape, starting to make chrysalis    |
| December 10, 2021 | ‘A’ – dark green chrysalis ‘C’ – bright green chrysalis | |
| December 12, 2021 | ‘A’ – dark green chrysalis ‘C’ – bright green chrysalis | |
| December 15, 2021 | | ‘A’ – very dark black chrysalis in the morning, by the afternoon, the butterfly had emerged – (see video of release below) ‘C’ – darker green chrysalis |
| December 18, 2021 | ‘C’ – very dark black chrysalis in the morning, by the afternoon, the butterfly had emerged and was released This was the final butterfly release. It was extra special as ‘C’ had hatched from its egg and was born in our Critter Comfort Cottage! |
We are thrilled our habitat performed so well.
Instar ‘C’ at stage 5.
Release of ‘A’
Overcoming Challenges
Presentation
Below are photos and videos describing our project as we would have done in a Face-to-Face presentation.
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Portfolio
Design Details
These plants are fake. The butterflies and caterpillars are masterpieces made by the team using clay, plaster, and ceramic paint to present this project face to face.
I’m so impressed!! Thank you for caring about the Monarch butterflies and building this castle! Obviously, an incredible amount of time and research went into your project and it sure paid off! Congratulations to both of you!
Great job, girls! If I were a monarch butterfly, It would be a dream to live in your Caterpillar Castle!
WOW! You put a lot of work into this project. Good luck!
Girls… This is an amazing project!
You did a very awesome job designing the caterpillar castle. I am sure this design will help Monarch butterflies to stay with us for many more years.
This is incredible. I think it is one of the best projects I have seen. What knowledge you gained from this experience! The documentation is exceptional and the whole project just blew me away!