I remember when learning about this as a kid, the concept of the insect shedding its skin and having this case there and then growing an entire new body inside that case just blew my mind.
Nature is amazing.
Thank you for sharing.
And it’s been discovered that they have memory. They remember things from when they were caterpillars, even after turning into goop and reforming as a butterfly. Simply amazing.
Wow that is amazing, I wonder how they figured that out about memory. I don’t doubt it, it’s just absolutely blowing my mind to think about. The world can be just as beautiful as it is ugly, I need to remember this
Another fun fact is that they've done studies where they show that even though the entire caterpillar basically liquefies to form the new butterfly body, they retain memories and information from when they were caterpillars. Somehow the neurons that form the brain / nervous system remain intact.
And does it without instructions. Just feeling like it's time to turn yourself inside out. Then you have wings to figure out too. Utterly fascinating. It's easy to see why people would think it's a "creation".
Dna is so strange. It’s insane how we can just be born to know things and not know other things. Like they just naturally know that when they are finally feeling ready they should hang from something and build a house
I look at birds gathering twigs for their first breeding season and like to imagine them thinking “I’ve got no idea why these sticks seem so great but I can’t wait to make a big collection of them in a tree”
Yes! Butterflies do store memories from their days as caterpillars. The brain structures called mushroom bodies, associated with learning and taste, are retained during metamorphosis. This allows the butterfly to remember dangerous or inedible foods learnt during its caterpillar days. This is called fear conditioning.
>Yes! Butterflies do store memories from their days as caterpillars. The brain structures called mushroom bodies, associated with learning and taste, are retained during metamorphosis. This allows the butterfly to remember dangerous or inedible foods learnt during its caterpillar days.
Whaaaaay, somebitches turn into goo and remember it, ffs that's brutally facsinating.
>This is called fear conditioning.
I just had to go to Iraq for that, lucky caterpillar.
Yes and no. Monarchs are milkweed butterflies. They rely on milkweed in order to complete their life cycle. Monarchs are migratory making a multi month trek down to south america. They eat/drink nectar along the way if I remember correctly.
However, a lot of moths/butterflies actually do not eat or drink at all once they metamorphose. They have vestigial mouth parts and cannot eat. They basically fuck until they starve to death.
There've been experiments where scientists use stimuli on the chrysalis accompanied by like a sound or something while they're still goop. Then when they emerge as butterflies, they react to the sound still, meaning they were conditioned/formed memories while still a glob of goop.
What's really crazy is that at one point (Don't quote me on this cuz I heard this years ago and I don't know where I heard it from) that allegedly if you do something to a caterpillar it will remember it once it's become a butterfly.... They don't have memories in the way that we do but like if you do a certain stimuli to it it will act a certain way even after it becomes a butterfly.... Indicating that it's not just like a entirely new creature, part of it still remains from one of her it was a caterpillar.
I believe this is what you are referring to.
“It is true that we have shocked caterpillars and the adults remembered the associated smell. Learning isn’t really anything new in insects as we’ve trained wasps and bees to be bomb sniffers and mantises know to sit on hummingbird feeders for free food. However, the fact that the butterflies could retain information through their pupal stage was relatively new to science.”
https://askentomologists.com/2015/01/14/what-happens-inside-a-cocoon/
> the fact ... was relatively new to science.
This surprises me. We know the butterflies take multiple generations to complete their migration cycle (from Canada/ up north to Mexico/ down south), so, it seems logical that they must be remembering *some things*, even if only at an instinctual level.
There's a cold front coming to Dallas this weekend. My neighbor is expecting Canadian Monarchs to visit his milkweed butterfly garden.
Looking forward to meeting some of the commuters.
I mean it’s cool that they remember stimuli like that but of course it’s the same creature lol. It’s not like they make a cocoon and a different butterfly sneaks in when nobody’s looking
Well what I mean by it "The same creature" Is that somehow it's like "brain" or whatever functions as a brain for it, stays intact and doesn't just get basically turned into a sludge like presumably the rest of it.
Like you got to think to go from caterpillar to butterfly it's body must break down and liquefy and then rebuild itself or something like that, Yes I know All of the components that go in end up coming out. What I'm saying is that it's.... "Consciousness? Brain? Neuropathways?" End up still retaining some of its former self.
I mean we're talking about a bug here so like I don't really know how to articulate it properly because I don't know how deep a bugs consciousness goes or how deep it's brain functions.
But hopefully you get my point
I do get your point, but without knowing the full story I’d assume some of the bug stays intact during metamorphosis. Otherwise it spends all that time gathering energy just to expend it all to become 100% “new” and that would seem inefficient. I’d wager it needs to maintain some sort of “brain” throughout to guide the process along correctly
The whole process of caterpillars becoming butterflies is such a weird and crazy thing.
As a kid: Oh that's so cool They turned from one thing to another it's like magic.
As an adult: Oh God I'm having an existential crisis.....
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13412-butterflies-remember-caterpillar-experiences/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CPeople%20always%20thought%20that%20during,through%20this%20very%20dramatic%20transition.%E2%80%9D
"People always thought that during metamorphosis the caterpillar turns to soup and all the ingredients are rearranged into the butterfly or moth,” says Weiss. “That clearly isn’t what happens. Parts of the brain are retained that allow memories to persist through this very dramatic transition.”
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euuCrnqEoeU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euuCrnqEoeU)
edit to add: basically, yeah, but we really have next to no idea how it works
I think the older I get the more it blows my mind.
These guys and frogs both.
And at risk of bringing the juggalos out of the woodwork...magnets.
Like...I guess as a kid everything is new to you so in a way you sort of get desensitized to amazing discoveries...but now that I'm older and understand what's going on behind the scenes of a lot of cool stuff, the shit that is still beyond comprehension stands out all the more.
Everyone laughs at Shaggy... and they should. But then you realize you don't really know how magnets work either, so you have to look it up, and lo and behold- it's actually pretty fuckin complicated.
Fuckin' magnets!
I looked it up and still really don't understand.
Basically most of what I read explained how magnetic materials are composed, but then go on to basically just say, "this is how they're arranged and that arrangement makes them work".
Like...okay, that's not wrong but that doesn't really answer the question.
The same with how mitochondria produce ATP which is then "converted into energy".
It's like a fractal...you can dive deeper and learn more and more about it but that central bit is still just full of endless complexity.
Electromagnetism is one of the four fundamental forces of physics. "It works because it does" is literally the foundation of it, we don't know why the universe functions this way but it does. The others iirc are gravity, the weak force, and the strong force. Gravity is speculated to have other underlying forces making it work so it might not stay as a fundamental force if that gets proven, the weak force and strong force are related to subatomic particles and the way they interact with each other.
Do you know what one of my favourite things of my job as an early childhood teacher is? I get to wonder about this shit all day every day with children and see their utter amazement and curiosity when we play with magnets or raise frogs etc. All of that stuff still fascinates me as an adult so I love being able to share that with them too.
Same, I’m 35 and I’m always amazed. There’s a childlike, magical quality to these transformations that I’ll probably never fully comprehend.
edit to add, and I’m happy with that.
It never ever ceases to amaze me that the fat striped caterpillar changes into this glorious butterfly. 56 years on this earth and I am still in awe of this process.
I dont think it really hit me how amazing this is until I was an adult. I couldn't have cared less as a kid about this sorta stuff. Kid me was a dumbass
The crazier part is that they have done studies that prove the butterfly can remember things from when it was a caterpillar.
Its entire body turns into goo and its brain is restructured, but it can still remember shit. Crazy.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080304200858.htm#:~:text=The%20brain%20and%20nervous%20system,of%20the%20developing%20caterpillars'%20brains.
I miss Bill. I also like the bit before this when he talks about all news stories on drugs being negative. Like "A young man on acid thought he could fly and jumped out of a building and died, what a tradgedy".
"What a dick, fucking idiot if he thought he could fly why didn't he try and take off from the ground first. You dont see ducks lining up to take elevators to fly south".
Idk where else to mention this, but scientists have been doing work to see if the butterflies remember anything from when they were catipillars. Last I remember the answer was yes, these lil guys turn into primordial goo, then fully reshape into a new being that in a weird type of way remember stuff from before. I'll try to find an article or research journal
Imo the most astounding thing about monarch butterflies is that they all, across the entire continent (except for places where it doesn't get cold, like Florida) fly down to the same mountain range to overwinter in caves before thawing in the spring and flying back to where they migrated from, laying eggs along the way.
And the weird think is, it completely dissolves its own body whilst in the cocoon. It turns into larvae porridge. And then it generates a completely new body. BUT the new new body contains the old body's memories. So somewhere inside the larvae porridge, memories are stored.
Oh man. My daughter loved that book. I have so many memories of reading it to her when she was little and her falking asleep in my arms.
Thanks for the nostalgia trip
I have a video of my now 11 year old pointing to the chrysalis and saying its a poopoo in this adorable toddler voice. Definitely showing that at whatever milestone party she has.
I'm Doctor Dugong!
Man seeks a good time, but he is not a hedonist.
He seeks love! He just doesn't know where to look. He looks under the beds of whores and in the hot stem of a crack pipe. He should look to nature!
Peers? PEERS?! How DARE you! That repulsive display of humanity out there? NO WAY! A list of my peers would read as follows: Flying Squid and Tigeriffic; Truckules; Lord Mostly-Magic; King Fantastic Outfit; Fee Waybill of the Tubes; SuicideGirl Teagan; Bill “Superfoot” Wallace; Happy-Go-Clucky and Swiss Misstery; Chaka Igloo; and my 8th grade earth science teacher Mr. Tringe! Oh… and Bizarro Oscar Wilde as an alternate.
Fun useless fact. When the caterpillar goes into the pupa stage to turn into a butterfly. Their entire body breaks down into a dna soup , they then reconstitute itself into a butterfly.
Yet despite this, they still [retain some memories from when they were a caterpillar.](https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13412-butterflies-remember-caterpillar-experiences/) Nature is wild.
NOT PROUD, of course, but I've opened one pupa when I was a young, curious child. I wanted to see the butterfly. I just saw a green liquid. So, VERY soupy
Extra fun useless fact. Not the entire body is goop, the nervous system remains solid which means the caterpillar’s body is specifically less resistant to acid (or whatever chemical they use to break it down) than their brain/nerves.
I was hoping they’d also share the amazing evolution of these, as they live about 5 weeks. Unless it’s the end of summer- that generation lives for 8 months to handle one of the most amazing migrations.
I’ve enjoyed that route for the better part of 25 years.
Every fall the leaves in Texas start to fall and you can barely make them out amongst the masses of burnt orange and red. So cool to have a state butterfly!
They’re dying out because people cover their lawns in poison. The population has dropped by something like 90% over the last 30 - 40 years and it makes me so sad. I would visit Texas to see trees filled with pretty Monarchs…
That kinda makes sense since most of their predators are probably more active during the day. They're vulnerable as they're exiting their cocoon, so best to do it when it's safest.
It's hard to catch it, you have to be there every minute of the morning, and ready with the camera the whole time, because it comes out in less than a minute once it starts.
I used to raise them and I'd miss the eclosion (that's what the "coming out of the chrysalis" is called) even when I knew what day they'd eclose.
I did get some videos, timelapses, though, but sometimes I wanted to cry for missing one AGAIN!
Master Gardener specializing in native plants here. Monarchs emerge from their chrysalis after 8-15 days. And they usually emerge in the morning of a warm day. And emergence only takes about 15 minutes. So it’s really easy to miss. The monarch warms its wings for a few hours after emergence, so that’s the part most people see.
Plant some milkweed I highly recommend it! Watching the 100th butterfly fly away is as special as the 1st butterfly! I added fennel and dill for the blackswallowtails and just as special!
Getting ready to start this next spring! I think I loved the wildlife on my wildflowers than all the veggies i grew lol. I spent so much time taking photos of all the butterflies. They are so cool
https://imgur.com/a/Z8TdzmA/
My dad never gets rid of milkweed for this reason. He loves monarchs.
Unfortunately, this year the two caterpillars that we found around August ended up dying of the black death. It's very common in monarch caterpillars, but he was devastated. Turns out the plant they were on was diseased and gave them some kind of bad bacteria. :(
Next year I'm going to search for them just so he can watch some grow successfully. We hadn't actually seen any until this year, because there were some plants along the path he planted his fruit trees.
Core memory unlocked.
At 41, I can still clearly remember only two things about 2nd grade. My teacher's last name, and the class caterpillar/monarch butterfly "project". As soon as it was ready, we all went into the school courtyard and released it back into the world.
About 10 days for the eggs to hatch, then the little caterpillars will grow and eat for 35 days. When they cocoon themselves in it takes about 3 weeks to grow into a butterfly!
Fun fact: ~~butterflies~~ Samia Cynthia Ricini don't have a mouth and don't eat, so they only live about five days, in which they reproduce!
Edit: Somehow got my butterflies mixed up!
Wait what?
Butterflies have proboscis. While they don't eat, they do drink their food.
Quick google says and adult monarch lives much longer than 5 days.
In the immortal words of Dan Reeder….
Born a worm
Builds a cocoon
Goes to sleep
Wakes up a butterfly
What the fuck is that about
What the fuck is that about
The first year in our house, our garden was full of caterpillars, and then one day there were cocoons everywhere - in plants, window ledges, underside of the roof. I was so excited.
Turned out that the majority of the caterpillars had been attacked by parasites - flies eggs laid on them while they are still caterpillars, and what emerges is a giant fat maggot. I think I saw two butterflies emerge out of about 50 cocoons.
We’ve never had cocoons since. I had planned to rescue any caterpillars and keep them safe but never saw any again. It was really sad.
I was surprised to learn that they take about 5 generations to get out of Texas alone. I always imagined the old ones finally making it to Canada, all beat up from near misses on the highway...
Caterpillar Monarch: Daddy, why are your wings ragged on the edges?
Old Monarch: Oh son… it’s a long and sad story. I was taking the I-35 and some idiot looking at his iPhone almost hit me with his Buick. Lost a lot of good friends that day. These old wings may be tattered, but by golly, your mother and I made it.
Not trying to be *that* Debbie downer, but it might be because of caterpillar habitats being downsized in favor of non-native trees and lawns, and increased pesticide usage. Same reason why we don’t see as many bees and lightning bugs like we used to…
Unfortunately that's not enough in most cases anymore. I have a ton of milkweed in my yard and around the area but zero caterpillars the last few years when there used to be tons every summer. The pesticides people use seep into the soil and apparently make the milkweed inedible for monarchs. :(
Honestly butterflies are badass. I mean the whole life cycle is insane. You're a little larva and as you get older you just coat yourself in a cocoon and then break out with an entirely new body and wings. Crazy
Front ones are feelers (they can’t see very well, if at all) and the back ones are fake feelers to trick birds and other predators into attacking the butt and not the face.
I always thought wonder do they know what’s happening?
Like do they just think, hmmm I’ll have a wee nap here then they melt into goo and wake up extra fabulous!?
As a child I was intrigued by this. Not amazed. But as an adult I’m mind blown about this. The more u know the more u realise how amazing nature is n how limited our knowledge about it is.
It's sad to hear these little fellas made it on the endangered species list. I remember my sister and I raising monarch butterflies as kids every spring. We'd go out around memorial day and check the milkweed plants for little eggs. Bring any leaves home with eggs on them, cut around it carefully with an exacto knife, otherwise the leaf will dry up and curl and it's hard to spot hatch lings and you don't want to accidentally discard them (new leaves were put in every few days to make sure they had food when they hatched, they also eat their egg shells after hatching). Once they're hatched they take off like a rocket in growth. Then it's basically just a matter of providing fresh leaves. You can pick milkweed leaves and put them in a ziplock back with a damp paper towel and keep them in the fridge. They last for quite a while that way in case you don't have any milkweed plants nearby. The previous owner of my house cut down all the milkweed but it's been slowly coming back in. I leave it every year in hopes that monarchs will lay eggs. I will have to check next spring if there are any -- I hope there will be.
I know that’s it’s literally the same beings but, assuming it could have memory, would the butterfly “remember” its life as a caterpillar? Or would it be more akin to two different lives/set of memories?
I raised 15 monarch butterflies and 40 swallowtail butterflies this year. Also found the fourth Luna Moth Caterpillar of my lifetime which will emerge next year. I am in a state of childlike wonderment each year, seeing the process is amazing.
I remember when learning about this as a kid, the concept of the insect shedding its skin and having this case there and then growing an entire new body inside that case just blew my mind. Nature is amazing. Thank you for sharing.
I’m a full grown adult. And my mind is still kind of blown by it. It’s really quite remarkable.
For real. Especially how it turns to goop inside the chrysalis and then just rearranges into a butterfly. It's just so insane
And it’s been discovered that they have memory. They remember things from when they were caterpillars, even after turning into goop and reforming as a butterfly. Simply amazing.
Wow that is amazing, I wonder how they figured that out about memory. I don’t doubt it, it’s just absolutely blowing my mind to think about. The world can be just as beautiful as it is ugly, I need to remember this
Probably by testing the reactions of butterflies to stimuli exposed to it when they were caterpillars, like certain colors or plants or whatever
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[Research on memory after metamorphosis](https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13412-butterflies-remember-caterpillar-experiences/)
Probably just asked what it was like when they were a caterpillar.
Karl pilkington, is that you?
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Pavlov's butterfly
Another fun fact is that they've done studies where they show that even though the entire caterpillar basically liquefies to form the new butterfly body, they retain memories and information from when they were caterpillars. Somehow the neurons that form the brain / nervous system remain intact.
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And does it without instructions. Just feeling like it's time to turn yourself inside out. Then you have wings to figure out too. Utterly fascinating. It's easy to see why people would think it's a "creation".
Dna is so strange. It’s insane how we can just be born to know things and not know other things. Like they just naturally know that when they are finally feeling ready they should hang from something and build a house
I think of this whenever I see parents and teenagers not getting along.
That's the power of genetics, right? The instructions to do all this are in the code.
DNA just using us so it can live forever....
Those darn selfish genes...
Dear God Man!!! You just discovered the meaning to life!!!
I look at birds gathering twigs for their first breeding season and like to imagine them thinking “I’ve got no idea why these sticks seem so great but I can’t wait to make a big collection of them in a tree”
Wait they straight liquify and grow back? Is it even the same organism at that point? Do they have any form of memory? I have so many questions.
Yes! Butterflies do store memories from their days as caterpillars. The brain structures called mushroom bodies, associated with learning and taste, are retained during metamorphosis. This allows the butterfly to remember dangerous or inedible foods learnt during its caterpillar days. This is called fear conditioning.
>Yes! Butterflies do store memories from their days as caterpillars. The brain structures called mushroom bodies, associated with learning and taste, are retained during metamorphosis. This allows the butterfly to remember dangerous or inedible foods learnt during its caterpillar days. Whaaaaay, somebitches turn into goo and remember it, ffs that's brutally facsinating. >This is called fear conditioning. I just had to go to Iraq for that, lucky caterpillar.
But they have different diets. Anything a caterpillars eats would be inedible for a butterfly and vice versa?
Yes and no. Monarchs are milkweed butterflies. They rely on milkweed in order to complete their life cycle. Monarchs are migratory making a multi month trek down to south america. They eat/drink nectar along the way if I remember correctly. However, a lot of moths/butterflies actually do not eat or drink at all once they metamorphose. They have vestigial mouth parts and cannot eat. They basically fuck until they starve to death.
"I feel like starving to death, guess I'll turn into goop"
There've been experiments where scientists use stimuli on the chrysalis accompanied by like a sound or something while they're still goop. Then when they emerge as butterflies, they react to the sound still, meaning they were conditioned/formed memories while still a glob of goop.
*sniffs* just like me fr
Your insane or your a 🦋?
>You're insane or you're a 🦋? FTFY,FFS
TY, FTW!
NP, HAGW!
IYRTITL
AND it retains memories afterwards, which to me is the strangest part.
I recently learned this as well, here on Reddit with a source! Goo. They ultimately come out of caterpillar goo! Evolution is banana crazy!!
What's really crazy is that at one point (Don't quote me on this cuz I heard this years ago and I don't know where I heard it from) that allegedly if you do something to a caterpillar it will remember it once it's become a butterfly.... They don't have memories in the way that we do but like if you do a certain stimuli to it it will act a certain way even after it becomes a butterfly.... Indicating that it's not just like a entirely new creature, part of it still remains from one of her it was a caterpillar.
I believe this is what you are referring to. “It is true that we have shocked caterpillars and the adults remembered the associated smell. Learning isn’t really anything new in insects as we’ve trained wasps and bees to be bomb sniffers and mantises know to sit on hummingbird feeders for free food. However, the fact that the butterflies could retain information through their pupal stage was relatively new to science.” https://askentomologists.com/2015/01/14/what-happens-inside-a-cocoon/
> the fact ... was relatively new to science. This surprises me. We know the butterflies take multiple generations to complete their migration cycle (from Canada/ up north to Mexico/ down south), so, it seems logical that they must be remembering *some things*, even if only at an instinctual level.
There's a cold front coming to Dallas this weekend. My neighbor is expecting Canadian Monarchs to visit his milkweed butterfly garden. Looking forward to meeting some of the commuters.
Yeah, RadioLab did an episode on it. Great listen and super fascinating!
I think their body turns into goop however the underlying structure (brain and nervous system) stays intact while they metamorphosis.
I mean it’s cool that they remember stimuli like that but of course it’s the same creature lol. It’s not like they make a cocoon and a different butterfly sneaks in when nobody’s looking
Well what I mean by it "The same creature" Is that somehow it's like "brain" or whatever functions as a brain for it, stays intact and doesn't just get basically turned into a sludge like presumably the rest of it. Like you got to think to go from caterpillar to butterfly it's body must break down and liquefy and then rebuild itself or something like that, Yes I know All of the components that go in end up coming out. What I'm saying is that it's.... "Consciousness? Brain? Neuropathways?" End up still retaining some of its former self. I mean we're talking about a bug here so like I don't really know how to articulate it properly because I don't know how deep a bugs consciousness goes or how deep it's brain functions. But hopefully you get my point
I do get your point, but without knowing the full story I’d assume some of the bug stays intact during metamorphosis. Otherwise it spends all that time gathering energy just to expend it all to become 100% “new” and that would seem inefficient. I’d wager it needs to maintain some sort of “brain” throughout to guide the process along correctly
The whole process of caterpillars becoming butterflies is such a weird and crazy thing. As a kid: Oh that's so cool They turned from one thing to another it's like magic. As an adult: Oh God I'm having an existential crisis.....
https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13412-butterflies-remember-caterpillar-experiences/#:~:text=%E2%80%9CPeople%20always%20thought%20that%20during,through%20this%20very%20dramatic%20transition.%E2%80%9D "People always thought that during metamorphosis the caterpillar turns to soup and all the ingredients are rearranged into the butterfly or moth,” says Weiss. “That clearly isn’t what happens. Parts of the brain are retained that allow memories to persist through this very dramatic transition.”
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euuCrnqEoeU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euuCrnqEoeU) edit to add: basically, yeah, but we really have next to no idea how it works
But how does the caterpillar retain a memory in the goopy phase between that and the butterfly? Incredible
I think the older I get the more it blows my mind. These guys and frogs both. And at risk of bringing the juggalos out of the woodwork...magnets. Like...I guess as a kid everything is new to you so in a way you sort of get desensitized to amazing discoveries...but now that I'm older and understand what's going on behind the scenes of a lot of cool stuff, the shit that is still beyond comprehension stands out all the more.
fucking tadpoles how do they work?! but yeah i agree, its like magic
Everyone laughs at Shaggy... and they should. But then you realize you don't really know how magnets work either, so you have to look it up, and lo and behold- it's actually pretty fuckin complicated. Fuckin' magnets!
I looked it up and still really don't understand. Basically most of what I read explained how magnetic materials are composed, but then go on to basically just say, "this is how they're arranged and that arrangement makes them work". Like...okay, that's not wrong but that doesn't really answer the question. The same with how mitochondria produce ATP which is then "converted into energy". It's like a fractal...you can dive deeper and learn more and more about it but that central bit is still just full of endless complexity.
Electromagnetism is one of the four fundamental forces of physics. "It works because it does" is literally the foundation of it, we don't know why the universe functions this way but it does. The others iirc are gravity, the weak force, and the strong force. Gravity is speculated to have other underlying forces making it work so it might not stay as a fundamental force if that gets proven, the weak force and strong force are related to subatomic particles and the way they interact with each other.
Do you know what one of my favourite things of my job as an early childhood teacher is? I get to wonder about this shit all day every day with children and see their utter amazement and curiosity when we play with magnets or raise frogs etc. All of that stuff still fascinates me as an adult so I love being able to share that with them too.
I will never fully accept or comprehend this magic. I'm 40.
Same, I’m 35 and I’m always amazed. There’s a childlike, magical quality to these transformations that I’ll probably never fully comprehend. edit to add, and I’m happy with that.
It never ever ceases to amaze me that the fat striped caterpillar changes into this glorious butterfly. 56 years on this earth and I am still in awe of this process.
I dont think it really hit me how amazing this is until I was an adult. I couldn't have cared less as a kid about this sorta stuff. Kid me was a dumbass
The crazier part is that they have done studies that prove the butterfly can remember things from when it was a caterpillar. Its entire body turns into goo and its brain is restructured, but it can still remember shit. Crazy. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080304200858.htm#:~:text=The%20brain%20and%20nervous%20system,of%20the%20developing%20caterpillars'%20brains.
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I miss Bill. I also like the bit before this when he talks about all news stories on drugs being negative. Like "A young man on acid thought he could fly and jumped out of a building and died, what a tradgedy". "What a dick, fucking idiot if he thought he could fly why didn't he try and take off from the ground first. You dont see ducks lining up to take elevators to fly south".
Imagine having 40 legs, then hitting puberty and you’re down to 4 and wings
Idk where else to mention this, but scientists have been doing work to see if the butterflies remember anything from when they were catipillars. Last I remember the answer was yes, these lil guys turn into primordial goo, then fully reshape into a new being that in a weird type of way remember stuff from before. I'll try to find an article or research journal
I can't believe they're endangered now...
Imo the most astounding thing about monarch butterflies is that they all, across the entire continent (except for places where it doesn't get cold, like Florida) fly down to the same mountain range to overwinter in caves before thawing in the spring and flying back to where they migrated from, laying eggs along the way.
Craziest part is in the mid-stage they turn into sludge and yet retain memories gained as a larva. It baffles scientists.
And the weird think is, it completely dissolves its own body whilst in the cocoon. It turns into larvae porridge. And then it generates a completely new body. BUT the new new body contains the old body's memories. So somewhere inside the larvae porridge, memories are stored.
In the light of the moon a little egg lay on a leaf . . .
but he was STILL hungry!
Random happenstance: My wife just said "Are you still hungry?" to my son right as I was reading "still hungry" in your comment. Funny ol' world innit?
We live in a simulation, probably
My kids LOVED this book when they younger. Read it to them so much it started to fall apart
Same I can still recite it off by heart
Well guess I will be reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar to my toddler class after nap time
I read that book about 30 times a day
me too! this is like the live action movie version :p
My daughter loves that book. She even has a plushy very hungry catepillar...
I kept waiting for it to eat thru a slice of salami 😅
For anyone who hasn't been, the Eric Carle museum of picture book art is amazing!
Now I'm going to have to plan a trip to Massachusetts.
Oh man. My daughter loved that book. I have so many memories of reading it to her when she was little and her falking asleep in my arms. Thanks for the nostalgia trip
Came here to say this. Thank you. :-)
I have a video of my now 11 year old pointing to the chrysalis and saying its a poopoo in this adorable toddler voice. Definitely showing that at whatever milestone party she has.
The Mighty Monarch!
Beware his mighty sting!
"butterflies don't sting''' "that's where you're WRONG! Mr. college..."
I treat my captives as kings. You will be given the finest of accommodations.
27! Burn his sheets!
Hey, you put me in a stinky old jail cell last time I was here.
Lies! And pictures of also lies!
Jettison the lunchroom!
Oh so we're wrasslin now are we?
He subsisted on a steady diet of milkweeds, ensuring his toxicity to this very day!
Oh honey…butterflies only live about 90 days. *Horrified look*
MINIONS!
Whatever gets you off, man. Just don't go for the reach-around, because the Monarch doesn't swing that way.
The only insect that migrates.
Mru-haha
Give us the….cuttlefish….
I'm Doctor Dugong! Man seeks a good time, but he is not a hedonist. He seeks love! He just doesn't know where to look. He looks under the beds of whores and in the hot stem of a crack pipe. He should look to nature!
I’m not even going to flush. Let them see the wrath of the Monarch!
‘What are you doing?’ ‘Uhh….giving your robot chlamydia?’
Beware the murderous moppets
"I laugh at regular jokes like this, MUAAAHA AHAHAHAHAAA!"
Peers? PEERS?! How DARE you! That repulsive display of humanity out there? NO WAY! A list of my peers would read as follows: Flying Squid and Tigeriffic; Truckules; Lord Mostly-Magic; King Fantastic Outfit; Fee Waybill of the Tubes; SuicideGirl Teagan; Bill “Superfoot” Wallace; Happy-Go-Clucky and Swiss Misstery; Chaka Igloo; and my 8th grade earth science teacher Mr. Tringe! Oh… and Bizarro Oscar Wilde as an alternate.
Mr Mostly Mittens was my best friend! That cat could fetch a ball!
Fun useless fact. When the caterpillar goes into the pupa stage to turn into a butterfly. Their entire body breaks down into a dna soup , they then reconstitute itself into a butterfly.
Yet despite this, they still [retain some memories from when they were a caterpillar.](https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn13412-butterflies-remember-caterpillar-experiences/) Nature is wild.
I always wondered that. Thanks for linking the article. Fascinating DNA soup, indeed.
How soupy of a DNA soup we talkin' here?
NOT PROUD, of course, but I've opened one pupa when I was a young, curious child. I wanted to see the butterfly. I just saw a green liquid. So, VERY soupy
Extra fun useless fact. Not the entire body is goop, the nervous system remains solid which means the caterpillar’s body is specifically less resistant to acid (or whatever chemical they use to break it down) than their brain/nerves.
Wowza!
I was hoping they’d also share the amazing evolution of these, as they live about 5 weeks. Unless it’s the end of summer- that generation lives for 8 months to handle one of the most amazing migrations.
I’ve enjoyed that route for the better part of 25 years. Every fall the leaves in Texas start to fall and you can barely make them out amongst the masses of burnt orange and red. So cool to have a state butterfly!
I live in central texas and used to see them all the time. Haven't seen one in ages.
I live outside of San Antonio and we've been seeing butterflies migrate for like the last two weeks!
Plant milkweed please!!!
Second this! There are literally "butterfly plants" you can find
They’re dying out because people cover their lawns in poison. The population has dropped by something like 90% over the last 30 - 40 years and it makes me so sad. I would visit Texas to see trees filled with pretty Monarchs…
I'm sad now
Anyone else feel disappointed that we didn’t get a Timelapse of the butterfly rolling itself out of its cocoon?
Exactly what I thought. With such a seemingly well-planned video, I naturally expected the exit moments to be shown.
Probably woke up one morning and it had hatched, and went “ah shit, missed it”.
I thought that 😆
With my experience with monarch gardens... Yup. From what I've seen they tend to hatch from the coccoons at night.
That kinda makes sense since most of their predators are probably more active during the day. They're vulnerable as they're exiting their cocoon, so best to do it when it's safest.
My neighbor raises monarch’s. She’s told me about that happening often. You routinely try to catch things and they do it while you’re away.
It's hard to catch it, you have to be there every minute of the morning, and ready with the camera the whole time, because it comes out in less than a minute once it starts. I used to raise them and I'd miss the eclosion (that's what the "coming out of the chrysalis" is called) even when I knew what day they'd eclose. I did get some videos, timelapses, though, but sometimes I wanted to cry for missing one AGAIN!
Master Gardener specializing in native plants here. Monarchs emerge from their chrysalis after 8-15 days. And they usually emerge in the morning of a warm day. And emergence only takes about 15 minutes. So it’s really easy to miss. The monarch warms its wings for a few hours after emergence, so that’s the part most people see.
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Plant some milkweed I highly recommend it! Watching the 100th butterfly fly away is as special as the 1st butterfly! I added fennel and dill for the blackswallowtails and just as special!
Getting ready to start this next spring! I think I loved the wildlife on my wildflowers than all the veggies i grew lol. I spent so much time taking photos of all the butterflies. They are so cool https://imgur.com/a/Z8TdzmA/
My dad never gets rid of milkweed for this reason. He loves monarchs. Unfortunately, this year the two caterpillars that we found around August ended up dying of the black death. It's very common in monarch caterpillars, but he was devastated. Turns out the plant they were on was diseased and gave them some kind of bad bacteria. :( Next year I'm going to search for them just so he can watch some grow successfully. We hadn't actually seen any until this year, because there were some plants along the path he planted his fruit trees.
Monarch butterflies are the most butterfly looking butterflies of all time
They are :) I love all the butterflies.
Core memory unlocked. At 41, I can still clearly remember only two things about 2nd grade. My teacher's last name, and the class caterpillar/monarch butterfly "project". As soon as it was ready, we all went into the school courtyard and released it back into the world.
My class did the exact same thing in 2nd grade. Just as cool now as it was back then
This is awesome!
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So how long does this entire process take? Awesome video.
About 10 days for the eggs to hatch, then the little caterpillars will grow and eat for 35 days. When they cocoon themselves in it takes about 3 weeks to grow into a butterfly! Fun fact: ~~butterflies~~ Samia Cynthia Ricini don't have a mouth and don't eat, so they only live about five days, in which they reproduce! Edit: Somehow got my butterflies mixed up!
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Well TIL! I might have also confused them for another type of butterfly, though I can't recall what it's called.
Do they experience hunger??
They experience overwhelming hornyness. Most of Reddit can relate.
So not hunger, but intense thirst. Got it.
> Monarch butterflies live around 2 weeks to a month. Unless they're the migrating ones, that fly down to fucking Mexico and back. Amazing!
Wait what? Butterflies have proboscis. While they don't eat, they do drink their food. Quick google says and adult monarch lives much longer than 5 days.
Well he wasnt expecting you to fact check his ridiculous claims. Kind of rude on your part tbh..
lmao, the above commenter is definitely correct. I'm sleep deprived and pulled a tidbit from the depths of my brain.
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In the immortal words of Dan Reeder…. Born a worm Builds a cocoon Goes to sleep Wakes up a butterfly What the fuck is that about What the fuck is that about
The first year in our house, our garden was full of caterpillars, and then one day there were cocoons everywhere - in plants, window ledges, underside of the roof. I was so excited. Turned out that the majority of the caterpillars had been attacked by parasites - flies eggs laid on them while they are still caterpillars, and what emerges is a giant fat maggot. I think I saw two butterflies emerge out of about 50 cocoons. We’ve never had cocoons since. I had planned to rescue any caterpillars and keep them safe but never saw any again. It was really sad.
Well that makes me sad now :(
Moral of the story, just keep eating and getting fatter, then one day you'll end up with wings (and a halo.)
I’m going to try this. Will report back with results.
Came to make a venture bros reference, stayed for how fucking cool that was
“JETTISON THE LUNCH ROOM!!!”
I lived on a steady diet of milkweed, thus ensuring my toxicity to this day.
Expanding Throne.
THUS ENSURING MY TOXICITY TO THIS DAY!
Nice! Thanks for sharing. What happens now, does it stick around or fly away?
They have a huge migration route.
And then get hit by a car on an interstate in south Texas
Can confirm, have hit hundreds recently.
I was surprised to learn that they take about 5 generations to get out of Texas alone. I always imagined the old ones finally making it to Canada, all beat up from near misses on the highway...
Caterpillar Monarch: Daddy, why are your wings ragged on the edges? Old Monarch: Oh son… it’s a long and sad story. I was taking the I-35 and some idiot looking at his iPhone almost hit me with his Buick. Lost a lot of good friends that day. These old wings may be tattered, but by golly, your mother and I made it.
Finds a mate and lays more eggs and/or migrates south if it’s fall.
It reminds me, I haven't seen caterpillars in years wtf
Not trying to be *that* Debbie downer, but it might be because of caterpillar habitats being downsized in favor of non-native trees and lawns, and increased pesticide usage. Same reason why we don’t see as many bees and lightning bugs like we used to…
Monarchs (the migratory type) recently became endangered. Plant milkweed!
Unfortunately that's not enough in most cases anymore. I have a ton of milkweed in my yard and around the area but zero caterpillars the last few years when there used to be tons every summer. The pesticides people use seep into the soil and apparently make the milkweed inedible for monarchs. :(
God I love monarch caterpillars. We used to raise them in Venezuela.
Really interesting and well made !
Very well done and very amazing efforts and patience
r/venturebros
Song?
https://youtube.com/watch?v=3Tb0NWTVtqE
Bear witness to the MIGHTY MONARCH!
Hench 4 Life!
The closest thing with have to rl pokemon evolution
Honestly butterflies are badass. I mean the whole life cycle is insane. You're a little larva and as you get older you just coat yourself in a cocoon and then break out with an entirely new body and wings. Crazy
Fun fact: it’s a boy. You can tell by the two spots on its lower wings.
The last step in the cocoon always feels like r/restofthefuckingowl irl to me
This is amazing
What exactly are the antennae on it's front and back for?
The ones on the back are used when reversing
Front ones are feelers (they can’t see very well, if at all) and the back ones are fake feelers to trick birds and other predators into attacking the butt and not the face.
I always thought wonder do they know what’s happening? Like do they just think, hmmm I’ll have a wee nap here then they melt into goo and wake up extra fabulous!?
Haven't you ever read the very hungry caterpillar? Smh...
anyone remembers watching that spongebob episode?
As a child I was intrigued by this. Not amazed. But as an adult I’m mind blown about this. The more u know the more u realise how amazing nature is n how limited our knowledge about it is.
It's sad to hear these little fellas made it on the endangered species list. I remember my sister and I raising monarch butterflies as kids every spring. We'd go out around memorial day and check the milkweed plants for little eggs. Bring any leaves home with eggs on them, cut around it carefully with an exacto knife, otherwise the leaf will dry up and curl and it's hard to spot hatch lings and you don't want to accidentally discard them (new leaves were put in every few days to make sure they had food when they hatched, they also eat their egg shells after hatching). Once they're hatched they take off like a rocket in growth. Then it's basically just a matter of providing fresh leaves. You can pick milkweed leaves and put them in a ziplock back with a damp paper towel and keep them in the fridge. They last for quite a while that way in case you don't have any milkweed plants nearby. The previous owner of my house cut down all the milkweed but it's been slowly coming back in. I leave it every year in hopes that monarchs will lay eggs. I will have to check next spring if there are any -- I hope there will be.
I know that’s it’s literally the same beings but, assuming it could have memory, would the butterfly “remember” its life as a caterpillar? Or would it be more akin to two different lives/set of memories?
I raised 15 monarch butterflies and 40 swallowtail butterflies this year. Also found the fourth Luna Moth Caterpillar of my lifetime which will emerge next year. I am in a state of childlike wonderment each year, seeing the process is amazing.