Night of the Polyphemus

As many of you know, we purchased cocoons from my bug dealer in Canada last fall.  They have been overwintering in my veggie crisper since October.  A couple of weeks ago, when the threat of freezing was over, I removed them from the crisper and have been patiently waiting for them to emerge.  Last week we were graced by the tiger swallowtail.  It was SO pretty and delicate and was off like a flash when we released it!  I had been told that the moths would probably take 5-8 weeks to emerge.  Looks like that was a bit of an over-estimate!  Last night while putzing around in the front room I noticed one polyphemus moth at the top of the enclosure drying its wings.  When I took a closer look, I saw the second one!  It had obviously just emerged and crawled up the enclosure as it hadn't pumped its wings up yet.  So we observed it for about a 1/2 hour until its wings were fully expanded, then we took them both upstairs to check them out!  These are seriously some of the prettiest moths on the planet!  Photo was taken on a black t-shirt!

 

To get an idea of its size, here it is in my 4 year-old's hand.

I was only able to get decent photos of one moth.  They were both females, which usually means they're pretty mellow, but one of them was just antsy beyond belief and I put her back in the enclosure as not to stress her out or wear her out.  I wanted to get a good shot of the underside.  You can tell it's a female due to the large abdomen and the skinny antennae.  

The last photo is my favorite, it really shows how incredibly beautiful this creature is!  She had a wing span of about 4-ish inches and she was magnificently colored!  I mean really, look at how black the black is and how vibrant the pinks are!

As always, I feel so lucky to have spent some time with these amazing moths.  After we took some photos and each of the kids got to check them out, we took them out front to the maple tree to release them.  Usually the females don't fly too much as they are so heavy with eggs, but in the time I came back inside to grab the flashlight and the camera, they had both flown off.  I guess our accommodations weren't up to their standards!  So I wished them good luck in finding handsome boys and laying healthy eggs!

Now we wait for the last 3 moths.  We're really looking forward to the cecropia as it will have at least a 6" wingspan!  We can't wait!