Caterpillar Coloring Pages

A caterpillar spends its whole life eating, and most of these caterpillar coloring pages find one doing exactly that, or looking for its next meal. They are drawn round and friendly, with smiling faces and little antennae, which makes them a favorite with young children who are not yet sure about real bugs.

The garden is the main stage. Caterpillars crawl along an oak leaf, a strawberry leaf and an apple branch, climb a tall sunflower, sit on top of a daisy, munch a hole through a cabbage, climb a fence under ripe tomatoes, explore a blackberry bramble, a pea vine and a row of carrots, and inch up an oak branch toward an acorn. One lounges on a spotted mushroom in a bobble hat, one peeks out of a basket of pears, one sips a dewdrop at sunrise, and one sits on the handle of a watering can in the garden shed.

Water and weather bring their own pages. A caterpillar crosses a pond on stepping stones, floats down a stream on a leaf, sits beside a ladybug on the stones and shares a lily pad with a frog. When it rains, one shelters under a leaf with a snail and another curls up inside a hollow log. In autumn a caterpillar crawls through the fallen leaves, and indoors one climbs a potted plant on the windowsill.

The playful pages are the ones children ask for again: a row of caterpillars pegged to a clothesline between spider webs, a caterpillar asleep in a leaf laced up like a sleeping bag, one relaxing in a hammock strung between two blades of grass, a line of them marching along a mossy log, one tiptoeing across a dewy spider web while the spider watches, and one resting on the head of a sleeping striped cat. A butterfly on a flower beside its empty chrysalis shows where it all ends. A patterned giant caterpillar, a chrysalis pattern and a border of caterpillars and vines finish the set.

From caterpillar to butterfly

A caterpillar is the second stage in the life of a butterfly or a moth. It hatches from a tiny egg, usually laid on the exact plant it will eat, and does almost nothing but eat and grow. Its skin does not stretch, so it sheds it several times as it gets bigger. When it is fully grown, a butterfly caterpillar hangs itself up and forms a chrysalis; many moth caterpillars spin a silk cocoon instead. Inside, its body is rebuilt completely, and a winged adult comes out days or weeks later.

Some caterpillars are very fussy eaters. The monarch caterpillar eats only milkweed, which is why planting milkweed in a garden is one of the best ways to help monarchs. The pages with the chrysalis and the butterfly make a good starting point for talking about the whole cycle: egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, butterfly.

Coloring a caterpillar

Real caterpillars come in far more colors than green, and a page can borrow from any of them:

• Green on green. Many caterpillars match their leaf to hide from birds. Try a lighter green body on a darker leaf, with a pale yellow stripe along the side.
• Warning stripes. Monarch caterpillars are banded in yellow, black and white, a signal to birds that they taste bad.
• Fuzzy ones. Woolly caterpillars are often brown, orange or black; short pencil strokes in the direction of the hairs make them look soft.
• One segment at a time. Coloring the body segments in a repeating pattern of two or three colors is an easy way for a young child to get a striking result.

Chunky crawlers and busy gardens

The simplest pages keep one big caterpillar in the middle with a leaf or a flower, like the oak leaf and the daisy. Quick to color, above the grid, begins with:

• Oak leaf caterpillar
• Morning dewdrop
• Apple branch

The detailed pages hide the caterpillar in a garden full of leaves, berries and patterns. Lots of detail begins with:

• Chrysalis pattern
• Caterpillar border
• Patterned caterpillar

A caterpillar story to read along

Caterpillars are the heroes of some of the best-loved picture books, and a page makes a natural companion to story time. Read the story, then let the child pick the page that matches the part they liked best: the eating, the sleeping in the leaf, the waking up as a butterfly. For a longer project, color the caterpillar, the chrysalis and the butterfly pages in the same colors and stick them in order on a strip of paper to make a life cycle poster for the wall.

Printing a garden of caterpillars

Every page is a free A4 PDF drawn at 300 dpi. A4 prints at full size, and on US Letter "fit to page" shrinks the drawing by about six percent so every antenna stays on the paper. The printing guide shows the setting. Add to pack gathers a whole garden into one file. The next stage of the story is in the butterfly coloring pages, and more small garden creatures are in the bug coloring pages, the ladybug coloring pages and the frog coloring pages.