Black Swallowtail

Early last week we went outside to water the garden. We found several rather ugly caterpillars eating our carrots. I started to flick them off. Then I had an idea. Let's capture a few and bring them inside and see what happens.

We weren't sure what we had. Thanks to Google, we were pretty sure that it was a black swallowtail. There are different types of black swallowtail but we couldn't narrow it down any more.

For about four days we picked a little carrot green and put it in their house. The next morning we had a chrysalis and a very still caterpillar hanging from the top corner. By the next morning, we had two chrysalises (chrysali?). That was about 5 days ago.

Since then they have been quietly occupying a corner in the kitchen. When Tim and I returned from the library this morning, the corner wasn't quiet anymore. There was the light sound of fluttering. And there was a butterfly. A black swallowtail. We're hoping to get another within the next day or two.