Late at Night a Leopard Moth Takes Flight...

At dusk The Bear and I took our Moth out onto the porch and opened the lid to his bug hunt and proceeded to sit and stare. Bear laughed at me, sitting there in my chair with my chin in my hands, eyes wide open just waiting for something to happen. Nothing did. Not even so much as a twitch of a toe. I finally gave up and came inside, thinking that perhaps he needed some private/quiet time to soak in the great outdoors. I kept peaking out the window but still nothing changed. 10:30pm came and went. 11:30pm came and went, still not even a toe wiggle. Finally Bear had to go to bed as he has to rise early and go to work. I was determined to stay up and watch what would happen. At 12:10am I went out on the porch with a journal and a glass of water and just sat there a wrote about the days events when suddenly out of the corner of my eye there was movement! I sat wide eyed with anticipation. His first few movements were shaky and unsure then with a stumble and a thrust he was over the lip of the container and on the ground. He flopped around a bit then as if drunk, he made a zig zag dash for the nearest bush (only 3feet away). He made it to the base of the bush and quickly and skillfully climbed to the top of a sturdy branch where he beat his wings several times then just sat there. With some quick thinking and very creative photography that included a scrap of red fabric, a rubber band and a flashlight I am proud to give you the last night time photo of our dear friend. I went inside for a moment to take my camera inside and upon returning outside, as if goodbyes were just too hard, he was gone. All grown up he took flight into the night and was out of our lives forever.

Ever since he made his cacoon I have been dying to take a peak inside so now that he was gone I took his leaves and stick out of his bug house to see what it looked like.

I carefully unwrapped it like a tiny package. It was really well constructed. Not as easy to unwrap as one might think.

I like this picture a lot. Can you see what used to be his face when he was a Woolly Bear?

This whole entire process from start to finish has been an utter joy. I'm so glad I could be there to see his first steps into nature and watch him beat his wings. Pure freedom.