Butterflies are beautiful, flying insects with large scaly wings. Like all insects, they have six jointed legs, 3 body parts, a pair of antennae, compound eyes, and an exoskeleton. The three body parts are the head, thorax (the chest), and abdomen (the tail end). The four wings and the six legs of the butterfly are attached to the thorax. The thorax contains the muscles that make the legs and wings move.

DESCRIPTION

.	Egg: Spherical, ridged and white.
	Caterpillar: The larva is banded with white/cream, black, and yellow stripes. It has three pairs of thoracic legs and five pairs of prolegs (which will disappear during the pupal stage). It has 2 pairs of sensory tentacles, one pair on the head and another pair near the end of the abdomen.
	Pupa: The monarch remains in its pupa for about 10 to 14 days. The green cylindrical pupa becomes transparent a day before the adult emerges.
	Adult: Bright orange with black wing veins and outer margins. The wings have white spots on outer margins, and three orange patches are found near the top of the forewings. The hindwings are very rounded, and they are lighter in color than the forewings. The body is black with white spots.

HOW TO TELL A MALE FROM A FEMALE
Male monarchs have a dark spot (scent scales) on the hindwing and have small claspers at the end of the abdomen. Females have thicker wing veins.

LIFE CYCLE OF A MONARCH BUTTERFLY
Butterflies and moths undergo complete metamorphosis in which they go through four different life stages. It takes about a month for the egg to mature into an adult.

• Egg - The Monarch starts its life as a ridged, spherical egg only l/8th of an inch long. The eggs are always laid singly, on the underside of milkweed leaves. The female attaches the egg to the leaf with a quick-drying glue which she secretes along with the egg. The egg hatches in about 3 to 5 days. A tiny wormlike larva emerges.
• Larva - The larva (caterpillar) hatches from its egg and eats it. Then it eats milkweed leaves almost constantly. The caterpillar molts (loses its old skin) four times as it grows; after each molt it eats its old skin. When the larva is about 2 inches (5 cm) long, it will stop eating and find a place (like a protected branch) on which to pupate.
• Pupa - The caterpillar turns into a pupa (chrysalis). The caterpillar spins silk from its spinneret and attaches its hind end to a branch with the silk and small hooks in the anal prolegs. it hangs head down and molts for the last time. When the newly-exposed skin dries and hardens, it takes the form of a jade green chrysalis. During this stage the caterpillar turns into a butterfly as its entire body is reorganized. In about 10-12 days the chrysalis becomes transparent and a damp butterfly soon emerges.
• Adult - A beautiful but damp adult emerges from the chrysalis. It pumps liquid into the wing veins to inflate them. They soon dry, but during this process, the butterfly is extremely vulnerable to predators. There is no growth during the adult stage. It can only eat liquids, which it does through its proboscis. This adult will continue the cycle by reproducing.

Other Monarchs stay in one area their entire lives.

LIFE SPAN
It takes about a month for the adult to develop (from egg to pupa to adult).

The life span of the adult Monarch varies, depending on the season in which it emerged from the pupa and whether or not it belongs to a migratory group of Monarchs. Adults that emerged in early summer have the shortest life spans and live for about two to five weeks. Those that emerged in late summer survive over the winter months. The migratory Monarchs, which emerge from the pupa in late summer and then migrate south, live a much longer life, about 8-9 months.

CLASSIFICATION
Order: Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths)
Family: Nymphalidae (over 5,000 species of butterflies with dwarfed front legs)
Subfamily: Danaidae (milkweed butterflies)
Genus and species: Danaus plexippus