Is that a 1st for you? Finding the cat in the hibernaculum??? That is absolutely amazing!!! I can't imagine them hibernating in the caterpillar form, but I guess that they have been doing it for hundreds of years. I will need to keep a better eye on them this summer. I saw a probable fresh RSP crys. on one of my crabapples last summer. It was late, and I needed to finish watering, so I didn't get it brought in. The next day, when I came home from work, the wasps had already gotten it. I was so mad at myself!! I checked the tree for other cats or crys., but could not find any. So, that's probably why I have not found very many of them. I know the birds really check them over for cats. :) Keep us posted on this special one.

Elisabeth, I got mine from Woodlander's, a mail-order nursery in Aiken, South Carolina. I couldn't bring up your links, so I Googled 'viceroy and red-spotted purples mate' and found the site. Reading the article was interesting, but I didn't understand some of the scientific terms. I read one passage that said something along the lines of they really don't know about 'alleles' in a way that suggests a red-spotted purple might carry recessive genes/alleles for viceroys traits and coloring. From the map, it looks like most of the interbreeding the article described takes place between the 30th and 31st parallels - I live between those two parallels, I'm just west of the Georgia/Florida area they researched. I've found numerous RSP eggs on wild black cherry all over my property, and I'm raising quite a few of them in cages on my porch now. This is the first time this year any RSP has used the willows, but it happens off and on from time to time. I have the willows, because I know that viceroys use it exclusively here, although in other parts of the country they reportedly also use birches. I have one willow in a pot, and the other one is planted in the ground. I cut the ground willow back all the way to the ground late last year, because it was ragged and unhealthy looking. It's come back this year, but it's only about 2' tall. So I put a large, metal dog crate over it, and I'll later cover it with mesh to keep wasps and other predators out. In the meantime, I think I'll use mesh to make little sleeves for the eggs, hatchlings, and small cats. Then I'll move at least some of them to the caged willow. I'd like to use the willows in case a viceroy visited without me knowing it, and some of the eggs are viceroys. If I run out of leaves, there are plenty of willows locally that I can harvest leaves from - I'd finish raising them in a cage on the porch, if that happens. I'm also wondering if the RSP that I saw laying the eggs carries viceroy genes, which is why she'd use willows? I have a nephew with red hair, even though neither of his parents have it. However, his maternal grandmother had red hair, as do his maternal uncles. This is the type of inheritance I'm thinking about here. Anyway, I'd love to see some viceroys, regardless of how they got here. It sounded to me like the writer of the article acknowledges the lack of knowledge about this subject. Sherry

You can't take a red-spotted purple off the leaf it was laid on. They make a string of frass from their original leaf, they rest on the end of it and go back and forth to eat at their leaf. Offering it food won't work, it needs its original leaf. It's a good idea to do research on a particular caterpillar before trying to raise it. They each have their peculiarities. Sherry

It's amazing how many caterpillars overwinter. I now practically do no fall clean-up unless I do a serious inspection of each plant. Even then, I put aside that brush--it gets its own special pile so that a butterfly could still crawl out if I missed somebody.