When we see a green Monarch chrysalis, we think of it as a green shell/cuticle. Actually, it’s a pale green. The bright green we see is the developing butterfly.
As the butterfly matures, we see the color begin to form a day or two before it emerges.
We took a badly deformed chrysalis and euthanized it. We scraped the contents off the shell. This is what the shell looks like without a developing butterfly inside.
