I was very pleased to see this butterfly after observing much of its life cycle. At least I thought I had…
Let me start at the beginning. Back in May, I was hunting for spring wildflowers when I happened to spot some bright orange and black caterpillars feeding on young shoots of turtlehead. That was before the turtlehead had any resemblance to turtles. Since I have learned long ago that “everything has a story,” I decided right then and there to keep an eye on those caterpillars to find out their story. I was thinking things like, What butterflies will they turn into? How do they live out their life? Who are their friends/enemies? What chemicals do the caterpillars get from the turtlehead? (I was assuming that since the caterpillars are so brightly colored, it is likely they are chemically protected.)
So, with those questions, I had set off on a quest to find out what I could about those caterpillars. During the next few weeks, I occasionally checked on them as they grew.
While there in the turtlehead patch, I saw other interesting insects. I was delighted to spy a spectacularly-patterned, conspicuous Baltimore checkerspot chrysalis. That was in early June. A couple of weeks thereafter, a somewhat newly emerged Baltimore checkerspot posed nicely for me in the turtlehead patch. I was elated to have seen these stages of the Baltimore checkerspot’s life story. But, it had never occurred to me that those caterpillars had actually hatched the summer before and had overwintered as caterpillars. So, in reality, I hadn’t seen the caterpillar’s whole life story. Realizing that renewed my quest.
But I did not see any caterpillars in the turtlehead patch when I checked in the late summer and fall. I had the same results in the spring. Sometime along in there, the right-of-way maintenance people trimmed and sprayed under the power line, and that set back the turtlehead patch. I supposed that would affect my Baltimore checkerspots one way or another, so I started searching in a few other turtlehead patches. I haven’t seen the caterpillars in the turtlehead since the day I found the butterfly. I’ll have to add into my search other Baltimore checkerspot secondary host plants such as viburnums and plantains.
Oh, I did see some blooming turtlehead during my visits to those patches, but none of them were very pretty. Because of that, at least for now, turtlehead flowers seem to me to be, well, reptilian. Maybe in the future I’ll see some blooming turtlehead that could actually be considered pretty.
Come to think of it, perhaps the flowers I saw were ugly because they were visited so much by the bumblebees coming to take their medicine. Oh, that’s right, we didn’t get to that part of the turtlehead story yet. Remember those Baltimore checkerspot caterpillars feeding on the turtlehead? Their bright colors are advertising, “I taste awful!” They can do this because they are protected with a chemical called catalpol which they get from feeding on the turtlehead. Catalpol even gets into the nectar, which in turn is very effective at getting rid of bumblebee gut parasites. I wonder, do the bumblebees visit the turtlehead purposely like we would a medicine cabinet?
As you can see, my quest is just starting. I’ll have to keep watching turtlehead patches as well as nearby viburnums and plantains for those brightly colored caterpillars. Then, too, I’ll have to take note of those other critters associated with the turtlehead. And wouldn’t it be fun to see a bumblebee taking its turtlehead medicine?