Asked and Answered

It's so nice to have a question answered.

You remember the chrysalis that was Backyard Bug of the Day a couple of days ago? And yesterday I discovered that it had changed color, and was darker? And I thought that maybe it meant that it would eclose soon? Well, I figured that if it was going to eclose soon, my best chance to find out what was inside was for it to eclose in an enclosed place, so I put it in my little bug viewer and left it on the back porch. Then today when I was going back into the house at the end of my bug walk (just before 3:00), I saw that it had gotten even darker:

Then later, around 5:00, I went outside again, and looked at it as I passed by, and saw that it had gotten lighter. But when I looked closely, I saw it hadn't changed to a lighter color, it was empty!

 

 Then, as I was looking at the chrysalis case through the camera, I saw a movement, and there was the moth, hanging off the side of the leaf where the chrysalis was!

Backyard Bug of the Day:

So now, because it has changed form, it gets to be Backyard Bug of the Day again, only two days after its first time. I am not bothering to look it up, because chances are it's not in my books, or there will be 50 other moths that look just like it. It seems that the vast majority of Lepidoptera around here are basically nondescript brown moths, so that's what I was expecting to emerge from that chrysalis, and that is what did emerge, but it does at least have a pretty pattern on its wings. And now I know what was inside that chrysalis. My timing and guessing were very good on this–if I had found the chrysalis a week or more ago, I probably would not have spent all that time checking on it, so I wouldn't have noticed the color change.

As an interesting coincidence, when I first noticed the darkening color on the chrysalis, at the end of my bug walk, I was on the back porch about to go in the house. I turned toward the door, and right on the wall of the house by the door is where a ladybeetle was pupating. It's the same one that last week (or was it the week before?) I guessed one day would be turning into a pupa by the next day (I was wrong, and forgot to mention it, and then forgot to mention it when it did turn into a pupa). Anyway, I noticed that the pupal case was open, and then...

 I saw the newly eclosed ladybeetle on the wall above it. It had its wings out; I don't know if they are out when it emerges, or if it emerges and then sticks them out. It could be like butterflies, that they have to extend them and pump them full of fluid to straighten them out. It's hard to believe that the ladybeetle fits inside that pupal case.

 You can see the dots are very pale...

 ... but when I went out later and found the newly eclosed moth, the ladybeetle was still there, and the spots had darkened.

Backyard Bug of the Day:

 Beetle

 Grasshopper

 Some of the minions have grown wings. I mean, some of the oleander aphids.

 Stinkbug

 One bumblebee today!

 Case bearing caterpillar, dancing in the wind.

 Stinkbug nymph (not the same species as above, I am pretty sure).

 Hoverfly

 Leaf hopper. Might be Bandara johnsoni

 When I put the chrysalis in the bug viewer, I put it in with a sprig of the goldenrod plant it was on, and there were a bunch of the flowers that had gone to seed. Apparently there were quite a few larvae living on that plant, because I found them in the viewer, too.

 Arachnid Appreciation:
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 Jumping spider