Swallowtail

We were shocked this morning to come out back and find this swallowtail butterfly had popped out of its chrysalis. 
The caterpillar had formed it back in Oct. 2022, and over wintered. That’s going on eight months and we had mostly given up hope and in fact almost tossed the whole thing. Good thing we waited because this beauty was more than ready to start off it’s new life.