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Thursday, December 3, 2009

UPDATE: Butterflies in Space!

A guest post by Jill Staake

On Nov. 16, caterpillars were launched to the International Space Station aboard space shuttle Atlantis as part of an experiment conducted by BioEd. The experiment included one set of four painted lady caterpillars and one set of three monarch caterpillars in specially-designed rearing chambers. Click here to learn more about the background of this experiment.

A popular question from visitors to any butterfly garden is "How high do butterflies fly?" As of Dec. 1, 2009, the new answer is "About 220 miles above the earth" - some of the caterpillars aboard the ISS have successfully completed the transformation to butterflies!

All four of the painted lady caterpillars are now fully-formed butterflies. Once aboard the ISS, they fed for several days, then pupated to chrysalis and eclosed (emerged) about 7 days later. The butterflies haven't seemed to experience any special challenges, and are behaving much like their counterparts on earth. You can check out some video of the painted ladies by clicking here. There are also plenty of pictures available on BioEd Online's Flickr site.

Now all eyes on are the on the monarchs. All three successfully pupated to chrysalis on Nov. 24, and can be expected to emerge... well, any second now! A few interesting notes about the monarch caterpillars - one of the caterpillars had trouble hooking itself to the silk pad once it pupated, and has existed as a chrysalis in a free-floating state. Another of the pupae seems to have become detached in the last few days and is free-floating as well. It will be interesting to see if this has any effect on the butterflies when they begin to emerge.

Look for another update on the butterflies in space sometime next week. In the meantime, you can follow the progress yourself by using any of the following links.
About the Author: Jill Staake is a volunteer at the MOSI BioWorks Butterfly garden who also writes the blog My Florida Backyard which is her story of transforming her suburban yard into a habitat for wildlife and her observations. Jill is also a regular contributor to the popular Tampa blog Sticks of Fire where she publishes posts about gardening in Tampa Bay.
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1 comment:

  1. KristenDecember 3, 2009 at 8:49 AM

    I am amused by the asteroid field of frass that the astro-flies have to navigate in any flight attempt

    ReplyDelete

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