Recently I had a chance to fall in love and in awe with the experiences again. My earth-loving dad had planted kaffir lime from seeds and it has happily grown into a 'handsome-looking teenage mini tree'. Its luscious green shoots had attracted some foreign visitors to make it a temporary home.
With its curled up leaves, I'm beginning to sense the presence of our new free bed and breakfast tourist. Not only one, but there were two. Initially, I was fine about letting the caterpillars roam and eat my young, luscious kaffir lime leaves. I began to panic, when I realised my poor plants, almost bald, as those two visitors made a wonderful daily buffet at those leaves.
I trimmed off the sections with both Caterpy A and Caterpy B in them and placed them in a plastic mini aquarium. By then, we have changed their diet to getting store bought old kaffir lime leaves. Both instantly went on a diet strike. One out of desperation continued to eat what was served.
About 3 days soon after, the caterpillar changed into a pupa. A mini worry mode set in as a friend of mine cautioned that at times due to changes in room temperature and other conditions, these pupa may fail to turn into butterflies. Praying hard, having good faith in Mother Nature and after another long week which for us an agonizing wait, they bloomed into gorgeous butterflies.
What I learnt from all these...
That Mother Nature and time go hand in hand. As human, we have the tendency to rush at things, forcing and insisting that we get whatever we want immediately and that very instant. The perils of modern technology. However, when we reflect on such simple experiences, sometimes what we want now may not be as fun as just waiting for things to unfold when the time is right.
And for kids, we are teaching them the life cycle of a butterfly popped right out of a textbook and experiencing it real life. After all, who says a pet needs to be only a cat or a dog.
Pictures courtesy of BFF-W.oneduh2010
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