Follow the Monarch Butterfly's life cycle
Butterflies go through a life cycle scientists
call Complete Metamorphosis.
They begin with an egg,
change into
a larva (caterpillar)
then they change into a pupa
and finally change during metamorphosis into an adult butterfly.
The caterpillar does not look like the adult. It
does not eat the same kind of foods the adult eats.
"Complete metamorphosis allows an insect species
to make use of multiple habitats. Caterpillars, for example, feed
by chewing on leaves. Their parents, butterflies and moths, feed
by sipping nectar from flowers through long tubelike mouthparts."
IPM
for Teachers
Fact: Scientists who specialize in studying
butterflies
and moths are called lepidopterists.
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