The Mourning Cloak caterpillars are sociable even when 

 changing to chrysalids 



Some Disguises of the Mourning-cloak 



Harriet A. Wickwire 



Cortland, N. Y. 



May in the woods! Hepaticas bursting into bloom; blue and 

 white violets down among the coiled ferns and dried leaves of last 

 fall; and, last but not least, a great dusky winged butterfly, danc- 

 ing entrancingly through the shadows and sunlight. 



Who has not seen it? Every one has been startled by the 

 appearance of this big purple-brown butterfly, bordered with straw 

 color, and having a row of violet-blue spots around the wings. 

 However, few of his many admirers really know the Mourning- 

 cloak in all his phases of existence. 



He starts life as a tiny melon shaped egg, first pale amber, then 

 changes through tan to rose and finally becomes blue-gray before 

 the minute crawler emerges. The egg period lasts about ten days, 

 and as the eggs are laid in close mats the caterpillars emerge toge- 

 ther; they eat together and live together also. 



For the first three days the baby crawlers are yellow, with black 

 heads and have a very greasy appearance. They form a nest of 

 silk, soon after emerging from the eggs, and eat young willow leaves 

 ravenously, growing to be a quarter of an inch long in four days. 



On the fifth day, the brood prepared to molt, the new heads 

 could be seen growing just back of the old ones and were black. 

 Two days later the molt took place, and the crawlers gained black 

 spines. 



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