Welcome to your new obsession! My husband thinks I have been off my rocker since I started butterfly gardening, lost count of how many years, now. Monarchs are eating machines, but when they are ready to molt or pupate, they just aren't interested in food. They will wander away from the food source, sometimes several feet away, when they are ready to pupate. My thinking is that they are much more vulnerable to predators when hanging in the "J" and until the chrysalis hardens, so they get away from the food source to try and fool any predators. I started off with 3 milkweed plants and I now have about 45! And still don't have enough food for the hungry cats when they really get going! I have started putting some plants under a netting to keep mommas from laying more eggs on them so that I will have some food for them when the pickings get scarce. Also, I put some cuttings in water and they leaf out in a couple of days. Mechelle

One of the nursery owner's in our state always brings her cats to shows and plant sales. Your cats won't be traumatized. It's a good way to get people interested in butterfly gardening. I used to take containers with all kinds of caterpillars to school. The containers would circulate throughout the classroom and sometimes, through the whole school. I like plastic containers like shoe boxes for displaying caterpillars. I put a piece of paper towel on the bottom, my water container with food, and a piece of tull netting on the top held in place by an elastic band. I buy the narrowest elastic and cut it and knot it. If you are feeding leaves, a good way to keep them fresh is to stick the stem end in a piece of floral foam--get the kind for live floral arrangements and not artificial ones. Little tiny pot saucers or old jar lids are good for holding the foam. The foam really absorbs the water and yet is not drippy. Make sure you check and add water as needed as the foam will dry out. Have a great time at the fair. Sandy

Oh what a pretty little BST cat...just love those colors. Now, down to Bug. I have him in a gallon plastic jar where I cut out 2 sides so I could clean and put in new food, filed the edges to smooth out and put smooth clear packing tape over the edges so he didn't get hurt. Wrapped the whole thing in bridal tulle I thought I might need for BSTs. Put in newly purchased wooden shish kabob stick in case he wanted to climb. He stayed perched up on indentation at top of container for almost a day but never shed skin...and didn't dirty the clean white paper towel anywhere...LOL. I'm wondering if he's having an adverse reaction to the milkweed because I didn't think and washed leaves in tap water from well which goes through water softener and is heavy on the salt. I figured he was going to molt as Miss Sherry mentioned but he didn't. Salt overload??? He looks dehydrated...thinner than when I got him and his antennae are drooping to the point of curling at times. Checked his sibling out in butterfly garden and he's still plump and eating like a little piggy. There's 2 more tiny cats I found but hesitating to see what happens with Bug before I endanger any more of the poor little things! This morning Bug had finally pooped once and found him munching a little but not chowing down. I went outside and got a fresh leaf that I washed with bottled water. When I moved him from old leaf to new he was kind of "stuck" to it beyond feet hanging on tenaciously and I saw a teeny, tiny bit clear gooey subtance when he separated from old leaf. Since around 5 this morning he ate the tiniest bit and now he's just sitting there again looking all pathetic and dehydrated. I brought him out here to the garage with doors open so he could get some fresh air but he's still just sitting there with those droopy antennae. One antenna is even bent which I don't know is normal or not. Don't know if he's just not happy with unnatural surroundings, if he was harmed by salt in softened water used to wash milkweed leaves, if he's sick from something else or just "pissy" as Tracey said. When I checked his sibling in the garden his antennae weren't droopy at all so I'm thinking it's a sign of dehydration because they flex and flick antennae but I haven't seen photos of them droopy or curled up. I know no one can diagnose my little Bug from afar but just let me know if you've seen droopy, curled or bent in the middle antennae on any of your Monarch cats and if they've bounced back or there's something wrong. Can't post pics since don't own camera and wouldn't know what to do anyway. I'm all "vaclempt" over my little Bug!

Calamity, yes, those are dichroic globs. I used 10 of them; the photo doesn't capture their beauty. They are predominately orange with a touch of green, fused onto black. I love dichroic and wish I could use tons of it on everything I do. These particular globs I bought off eBay years ago and I hoarded them all this time. Then I thought: Heck, why not just throw them in for the wow factor.