The Butterfly Redemption

How scientists, volunteers, and incarcerated women are finding hope and metamorphosis through supporting a struggling butterfly.

They are ravenous and roving. Newly emerged from a six-month state of suspended animation, over a dozen larvae scale the crumpled paper towel inside a plastic cup. One determined individual undulates past the others to the top of the paper peak. There, it anchors its hind prolegs, raises its head and abdomen, and begins a kind of dance. About the length of a paper clip, the caterpillar sways its black and bristly body back and forth. It reaches toward the light streaming in through the greenhouse glass and the face of the woman beaming down.

“It brings out the little-kid excitement in me,” says butterfly technician Heather, “something I haven’t felt in a long time. They want to see what’s going on. It’s like a little snake-charmer thing.”

Heather wears her dark hair in braids. She’s also wearing a bright red sweater marked DOC for Department of Corrections, identifying her as an inmate of Mission Creek Corrections Center for Women, a minimum security prison located near Belfair, Washington.