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A garden wouldn’t be complete without any visitors. Those flying insects and creepy crawlies, some are indeed scary while others are too cute to touch. Sometimes, it would accidentally end up dead on your palms because you’re quite excited to keep them. You might have asked, “What thingy is it?” Please continue reading and you could learn something interesting about it.

Butterflies are frequent visitors in a garden. Even though they are considered nuisance and pests by some crop growers (because they love to devour your plants until the stems are the only visible part left on the ground), they add color and vibrancy. Furthermore, like any other insects, they play a vital role to keep your flowering plants thrive and bear more produce. Perhaps we need to have a better understanding as to why they exist in the first place. We all know that they are part of the ecosystem where one benefits with the other living things. Why kill them when they only have a short lifespan? Unless of course you see a cockroach, would you fight or flight? I think a better option is to apply ‘squashology’, meaning to kill it kindly ha ha… Kidding!

One particular species of a butterfly is the Citrus Swallowtail. Its main food is obviously anything from the family of citrus plants and trees. One day while I was cleaning in our front yard, I saw some caterpillars on my baby citrus tree. I thought they’re just bird poos. But I noticed they’re moving and the leaves had bite marks. The kiddo inside me whispered, ‘Keep them!’, ‘Keep them!’ I was curious as to whether this might work, so I googled pieces of information about this type of insect. Funnily enough, I got some interesting suggestions from a gardeners’ group on Facebook.

I did keep them. I actually let them grew a little bit larger first (so there’s high probability for them to survive) before I transferred them indoors. The problem was I didn’t have any fancy containers as their temporary shelter. I just grabbed a plastic, take away container and poked plenty of holes on the lid so that the caterpillars could breathe. They’re supposed to be three, but by the time I collected them, one was already missing. It’s probably eaten by birds and geckos lurking outside my home.

For a few days, they’re busy eating and sleeping. And they grew very fast, too! Then they became looking like this. They’re in a pupa stage. Amazing, isn’t it? The first caterpillar stuck herself on the side of the container whereas the other one chose to stay on the stem. What captivated me is the part where the pupa turned into a chrysalis. It took three days to turn into this...(that’s from the time I kept them indoors). And it took at least 12 to 15 days before they reached maturity.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to record a video of their growing phase. Still my photos could speak for themselves. Alas, the time has come for them to transform. The first one unluckily failed to fully develop its wings. Surely it was a struggle so I let her crawl on the vines. The second swallowtail was a success! I named her ‘Blackwidow’. Me, busy as a bee and clueless as to when she’d exactly mature, I let her do her thing. After a couple of days, I finally saw her wings flipping inside the container and maybe shouting ‘Gemme outta here!’, so I hurriedly placed and released her outdoors.

It’s quite remarkable to witness their transformation. If you’re a nature lover like me, you’d definitely agree that nature is undoubtedly surprising. This experience is absolutely priceless! Nevertheless, it’s a bitter sweet feeling to see them flutter up and away. If only I could keep them forever! But they deserved freedom too, right? The fun part though is that Blackwidow likes to roam around in my itsy-bitsy garden. I hope she’ll live longer while fulfilling her duties and be with us as much as she could manage… #myblackwidow

What’s your story? Do you have a similar experience keeping a butterfly or any other winged creatures? Or maybe a dragon, ha ha! Share them on the comment box below!

Thank you very much for taking your time reading my very short blog! 

Know more about this kind of species here.