Red Admiral Chrysalis in closed up leaf?

Randy Emmitt birdcr at concentric.net
Tue Jul 17 19:06:57 EDT 2001


Folks,

Today in my garden I found a Red Admiral Chrysalis in a folded and sealed 
up False Nettle leaf. Just like they normally eat the leaves from their 
protected leaf shelter. My questions are was this caterpillar over zealous 
in what it could eat or was it planning on over wintering inside the leaf? 
I`d think if a Red Admiral adult emerged inside this live green leaf it 
couldn`t escape?

I`ve found only two caterpillars and loads of tops cut off by caterpillars 
in my 40 foot long native patch of False Nettle, many adults are visiting 
daily and leaving eggs.

I took tripod photos of the Chrysalis and had a bonus show up on another 
leaf a fat black and orange  longhorn beetle. The longhorn beetle I`m not 
sure if its using the False Nettle as a host plant or not.

Randy Emmitt
Rougemont, NC

Butterflies of North Carolina Online!
http://www.rlephoto.com/butterflies/butterflies.html
Carolina Butterfly Society webmaster
http://www.carolinabutterflysociety.org/


 
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