I am currently raising 15 monarchs indoors, and they appear to be doing well. All are in the chrysalis or near to it. However, there are a lot of caterpillars outside. The mother Monarch laid over 40 eggs, of which I brought in 20 and now have 15. I didn't think the outside ones would make it, or at least not many of them. Those eggs were mostly laid on tropical milkweed plants which were not huge. I went out to look recently and found large numbers of big caterpillars, much to my surprise. The tropical plants are nearly gone. I stuck some swamp milkweed in a jar and took that out to supplement, and some of them moved over. I covered them with netting. Some of the cats escaped and crawled off elsewhere to pupate, but several of them have attached to the net. However, it's kind of loose and floppy, not on a frame. If they hatch, will I be able to maneuver them out of the net bag and release them safely? Or should I try to delicately cut them loose and hang them up elsewhere to mature? I realize they may be parasitize and may not live that long, but if they do I would like to be able to let them go safely.

I also keep finding smaller caterpillars on my plants-maybe three quarters of an inch in length. I hate to leave them out there, but I don't want to bring them into the cages with my other butterflies. What do you all do with these guys when you find them? It's a bit of a moot point since I'm out of cages, but I'm sure the problem will occur again in the future.

Liz