The Ballad of Broc the Butterfly

We have a lot of wildlife in our new neighborhood -- we've seen deer, foxes, heard coyotes, seen bobcat tracks and black bear scat, and we have all kinds of crazy birds.

Most recently we've been visited by our neighbor's guinea hens -- he lives across the marsh, and we thought they were turkeys until they showed up behind our house doing a weird cluck/quackle noise, and then Bryce drove over while I watched them roosting on our deck boxes, and we discovered that a) they aren't turkeys, b) they are "free range," and c) they eat ticks and slugs. So, uh, we are the proud timeshare borrowers of some guinea fowl! They are awful cute.

Bryce the Pied Guinea Hen Piper

But then, we discovered we had wildlife INSIDE the house. One evening, we discovered a butterfly in the kitchen, on a mug near the (anemic) basil plant.

Broc, birthday 11/12/19 to our knowledge. 

It sort of looked like it had just hatched. Which was weird, because we'd had snow, and it's November.

But then, we remembered that in October we'd had some local broccoli, and when I cut it up, I was surprised by a bright green worm/caterpillar.

It looked something like this:

It was cold outside, and I didn't have the heart to send it down the drain or anything, so we just sort of... let him be. I admit, that's a little weird, to let a little green creepy crawly go loose around the house, but we have some potted herbs in the windowsill, so I think that's where he went. Because honestly, until the butterfly appeared, WE TOTALLY FORGOT THAT WE HAD A GREEN WORM IN OUR HOUSE.

And so, we christened the butterfly, which we found out thanks to Google Lens is a cabbage white butterfly (which makes sense because the picture above is from google and it is a cabbage white larva), Broc. (For the broccoli we found him on.)

We were sure he'd be short lived, but he showed up the next day:

Broc on the bar with some sugar water and the basil plant for familiarity

We were worried he didn't have anything to eat. Bryce put out a brussel sprout, but I think that's more of a caterpillar food than a butterfly food, so I put out the sugar water and a little fork ramp.

The whole time we were so nervous that Lucky would discover Broc, because Lucky is the Great Moth Hunter, and if he found Broc, that butterfly was toast.

The next day, Broc was still with us!

On the dining room cookbook bookshelf, under a lamp

But then, I didn't see him. Once we found him on the floor, just sort of sitting there, but most of the time we found him on the table, or on the side of the bar or bookshelf.

Then, yesterday, we saw him sunning himself on the sliding glass door window.

He's got SPOTS! 

It was like he wanted to go outside, but clearly, as you can see, there is snow and he would die pretty quick. 

I started to worry. First, he was in the bottom 1/4 of the sliding glass door, prime hunting grounds for Lucky. Second, the only flowers we had at the time are some dead mums (I did terribly with late fall gardening and killed all my mums I meant to pot with pure neglect), Bryce's orchids, and one early blooming Christmas cactus. I don't think Cabbage Whites go for any of that.

So then, I became the sort of person who buys flowers to serve as a food source for home-hatched butterflies.

Picked this one for the hydrangeas and the mums, which I think the butterfly can get nectar out of.

He didn't find it on his own though, and this morning we found him again in his favorite spot in the sunshine.

Still snow. Looking real pretty, Broc! 

This time, though, he did not escape Lucky's notice. It was very confusing for Lucky to see something white fluttering at the window and then have us freak the fuck out when he went to catch it, like he's done a million times with white moths without any fuss from us.

But Broc is sort of family now.

And so we were devastated when we thought Lucky had gotten the best of our fluttery off-white friend:

Wing dust from where Lucky batted Broc off the window

Wing dust on the sill from where he assailed Broc some more closer to the ground. 

We frantically shooed the cat away, and found Broc down in between the runners of the sliding glass door sill, looking all in one piece but traumatized.

Bryce used a piece of string to airlift him up to the flower arrangement, where he'd be safe from kitty paws and also have some food options.

Heal up, little Broc! And have a mum snack while you're at it! 

But then, I saw him looking all tilted sideways on the hydrangea a few hours later.

His little body looked all crooked and a little broken, too. 

Bryce begged me to leave him alone, that if he was going to be okay, he would, and if he wasn't, well honestly it's just a matter of time before the life cycle gets him anyway.

But this evening...

He's alive and well! And on the move throughout the flower arrangement, and hopefully snacking on that mum.

One day we will have to say goodbye to our new friend, Broc, but for now... he is a survivor. So he fits in real well in our house.

And that is the tale of our newest family member who hatched in the kitchen, Broc the butterfly who immigrated to our home in a bunch of broccoli and came into the world with wings on our basil (we think).