And so it begins

Last year, we got seriously into monarch caterpillar observation. I wrote about it here.

This year, I’ve seen a few caterpillars, but we’ve held off on bringing any home, thinking we’d wait till they get bigger. It makes for easier maintenance. But since we’re seeing far fewer than last year at this time, and since there’s no guarantee the little ones will be there if we wait and go back, I yielded last night to Younger Daughter’s pleas and brought this little fellow home. It’s quite sluggish; I think it may be ready to shed this skin.

*Edited to add: I wrote about the conclusion of this story at my other blog, here and here.