We were really afraid to hope about this one; the first one hatched, but its crumpled wings never filled out, the second one hatched and its wings filled out properly, but it died shortly afterward, the third one hatched and flew away and the fourth one never made it out of the chrysalis.
So we felt that it wasn't a very good record to that point. I was afraid we might have contracted the Ophryocystis elektroscirrha parasite, one symptom of which is that butterflies are not able to emerge from the chrysalis or emerge with crumpled wings. However, since this was the first time we had used the cage, we knew that the cage itself was clean, we were afraid one of the caterpillars might have introduced it to the cage and infected the others.
So, after mixed results with the first four, we weren't too hopeful of the fifth one.
Cindy had read something to the effect that Monarchs essentially shut down if the temperature is under 55 degrees; our days have mostly been warmer than that although the evenings have been getting down into the 50s, so I woke up thinking that maybe we needed to move the cage into the front yard where it would get direct sunlight. After about an hour in the sunshine, the chrysalis opened, the butterfly emerged, his wings filled out properly and he began opening and closing them.
It still took him the rest of the day and part of the next to get going. After a short initial flight, he landed on the Fortnight Lily and clung there for a while. We were so anxious for this one to be a success that Cindy went around and destroyed the webs of the various Golden Garden Spiders and Orb Weaver spiders (without harming the spiders) in the immediate vicinity so he wouldn't get caught in them.
And eventually he flew off.
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