Emperor Moth!

Story part 1 - Last year, a friend gave me a few larvae of the emperor moth. They hatched and I raised the larvae/caterpillars with my class. They loved doing this and took very good care to clean the tub out and make sure that the caterpillars had enough of the right food - hawthorn and bramble mainly. Some of them took them home at weekends and so on. We were then delighted (and quite amazed) to watch the 5th instar caterpillars spin themselves into a cocoon. I've looked after the cocoons since then and recently took them back into school. To our delight, this beautiful male emperor moth emerged during a lesson :)