The Butterfly Kit by Insect Lore: Educational Toy Review

If you are looking for a fun and education activity for your children, do not hesitate in ordering the Butterfly Garden from Insect Lore. The Butterfly Garden is a butterfly-raising kit where your children will be able to watch their caterpillars transform into chrysalids and emerge into beautiful painted lady butterflies before their very eyes. Your children will then have the opportunity to feed and observe the butterflies before releasing them into nature.

We ordered our Butterfly Garden online at the Insect Lore website and received our kit within five business days. The company sends three to five caterpillars (we received four in our kit) in a plastic cup with their special food sprinkled at the bottom. You will also receive a small booklet with complete care instructions and fun facts about the painted lady butterflies. A pop-up mesh habitat for the butterflies is also included with the kit. The habitat has a convenient zippered top which makes it easy to feed the butterflies. The Butterfly Garden costs only $24.99 (not including shipping) and comes with a guarantee that at least three of the butterflies will grow to be "perfect specimens".

It takes a few weeks for your caterpillars to completely transform into butterflies. Each day the caterpillars eat and grow. My daughter loved naming her net pets and checking on them daily to see if they were changing into chrysalids. Finally when the caterpillars start to crawl to the top of the cup and hang upside down, they are ready to start transforming into the chrysalids. Once all the caterpillars have changed it is time to transport them from the plastic cup into the butterfly garden habitat. In about a week the butterflies will emerge from the chrysalids. It is such a neat experience to watch the painted lady butterflies hatch and be transformed up close. We added fresh flowers and sugar water to their habitat. My daughter loved watching the butterflies drink the sugar water and fly around. Then it was time to release them. It was such a fun learning experience that we plan on ordering caterpillars from Insect Lore every spring.

I would highly recommend this kit to anyone with a child who is preschool age or older. Watching the life cycle of a butterfly up close provides a hands on learning experience that your child will always remember. I would also recommend the company Insect Lore. The customer service was great and we received our order very quickly.