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A little introduction for the non-Dutch people: AH is the abbreviation of Albert Heijn which is one of the biggest supermarket chain in the Netherlands. In February and March this year, for every 15 Euro, I received some vegetable seeds to create my own vegetable garden. After a lot of caretaking, I now have a lot of tomatoes and all stages of all Dutch white species. Their favourite of all vegetable/cabbage plants is broccoli. They ‘adore’ the leaves and some caterpillars have no problems with devouring all yellow flowers of the broccoli.
A nest of about sixty caterpillars of the Large White I found in their third skin; a few days later I decided to take them inside and feed them on my kitchen table.
After almost a week I found out that none of these caterpillars was infected by the White Butterfly Parasite (a wasp with the name Cotesia glomerata). That is a remarkable fact as normally a big part of the caterpillars is parasitised. A second notable fact was that the caterpillars did not accept little branches or other dead natural material which I offered them; a big part of the caterpillars pupated in a group on the plastic of the insect box and the other part on the green broccoli leaves. Fortunately one caterpillar transformed into a pupa on a day I did not have to work (see sequence 1).
In the meantime I found an other caterpillar nest of the Large White on broccoli and some new eggs of the Green-veined White and/or Small White but they have to survive outside as I have no more space available on my kitchen table!
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On the day of arrival in the Provence I found a tiny little caterpillar of the Swallowtail on one of the wild Fennel plants. For me not a special species so actually I had not in mind to spend a blog about the Swallowtail. I checked the caterpillar every morning and evening on my ‘butterfly route’. Ten days later when the caterpillar was grown he was resting in the fennel and two new eggs were laid. I really considered to replace him as I was afraid that he would eat the eggs….when I checked the fennel plant the same evening again the complete fennel stalk including eggs were gone.
11 Months ago I found on my Annual Honnesty (Lunaria annua) a tiny little caterpillar of the Orange-tip. Annual Honnesty is their favorite foodplant next to Garlic Mustard; both plants are growing everywhere in my garden so I'm finding almost every year caterpillars.  10 Months ago this caterpillar was at least twice the size and transformed into a chrysalis and hibernated outside in my garden until a few days ago:
A female Orange-tip was born and it is interesting to see how the butterfly unfold the soft wings. The drying proces of the wings takes more than one hour but once she was ready, she flew away.....I hope to find the next generation in a few weeks on the Annual Honesty!
On metamorphosis -> Orange-tip you can find the complete sequence. Last Sunday morning I noticed that the two caterpillars of the Painted Lady were hanging upside down in the 'get ready to transform into a chrysalis' position. In the first place I was very happy that this occurs on Sunday and secondly that I had no appointments made for that day. With a cup of coffee and the camera in the right position I started waiting....and waiting....and waiting. Hours later, just when the light was perfect the caterpillar started to move up and down and up and down and....stopped. Some later when the sky was painted black, the Painted Lady started to transform....and that's how it often goes....waiting for nothing!
In the meantime all the caterpillars of the Peacock are transformed into a chrysalis and in contrast to my former a lot of them fall victim to parasitoids.  A kind of 'worm' emerges the chrysalis through a slimy track, moves a bit and than it falls down to the ground to transform some later into a dark brown/black cocoon. At the moment about 50 to 60% of all chrysalises are brown with a slime path on it. Nature takes it course and while I'm writing this blog something unexpected is happening.....
Although I grew up with animals, in the beginning when I was living on my own I made the statement not to have animals as I would like to travel around the world. Then Max entered my life and the story of homeless, neglected and sadly looking animals started and probably will never end. This white beauty is Grabou; I found her (she called me) in the night I was ready to travel to France. She was five or six weeks old, I rescued her, put her in a basket and asked somebody to bring her to the shelter. That 'somebody' did not bring her to the shelter but locked her up in my rabbit-cage for weeks....with water and food she survived but without warmth and cuddlings she became a bit detached. Outside she's like a dog. When I walk to Mrs van de Breemortel, Grabou walks with me. She is also the one who attracts my attention (probably because she is white) when she found something. She is the expert in finding caterpillars:  Canon PowerShot (crop) While the last two caterpillars of the Swallowtail will transform into a chrysalis soon, I discovered some new caterpillars. It wasn’t difficult to find them as I was wondering where my Kale plants were gone.....a few weeks ago I received them as a present for my vegetable garden with beautiful green leaves.  It’s a kind of relief seeing that the larval stages of butterflies preferring my vegetables but I’m afraid that having my own big vegetable garden in France one day will be a challenge as I’m not able to kill caterpillars. These are caterpillars of the Small White in the 2nd caterpillar stage and measures about 1 cm….except the newborn caterpillar.  This image is taken with the special macro lens from Canon, the MP-E 65 mm with a 3,5 x magnification at F16.
In life you ‘need’ to have experienced everything once.......so a few days ago somebody scammed me! First I was upset as this Dutch guy was talking about ‘trust’ to me on the phone and I lost money for a new camera. Soon I learned that he is a professional impostor who is using hundreds of Dutch names and email addresses so I got triggered by his method and till today I found hundreds of crime reports......he has a splendid income every year! And I feel very very very sorry for him that he is deaf and that his wife is labouring that often...... As I’m very persistent Mr Cheater, the day will come that you will regret having scammed me....kiss my ass!  This blue horn is taken with the MP-E 65 mm and belongs to a caterpillar of the Lime Hawk-moth.
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Jibt dir dit Leben mal een Buff, denn weene keene Träne. Lach Dir'n Ast und setz Dir druff und baumle mit de Beene.
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