Monarch Fall Migration Mapping?

I have been interested in the Monarch Migration this fall and I have been counting monarchs on my walks through our butterfly meadow at the park. We seem to have a several around, but nothing like some of the other butterfly watchers have reported in other parts of the country: "Hundreds passing by in an hour, or nesting in a tree at night"...

The Journey North migration site http://www.learner.org/jnorth/monarch/fall2006/Update092206.html has lots of good info, and so does Monarch Watch http://www.monarchwatch.org/tagmig/fallmap.htm about the migration patterns

...but I am wondering if any DG butterfly watchers have seen large 'flocks' of monarchs passing through or roosting in their neighborhoods this fall?

I notice the Monarch Research websites are asking for everyone to report what they are seeing and to keep a notebook--I don't do that, but does anyone else?

What fascinating sites! Thanks Tabasco. I've bookmarked them to watch the migration.

Your photo is beautiful. Love the crispness of the Monarch with all of the colors in the background.

Janet

Edited to say.... I'll try to write down when I see any and report.

This message was edited Sep 26, 2006 7:44 AM

I only get a couple at a time except when they hatch out but they don't stay.

The Monarchs are here in hundreds. Some are stopping for a snack but most are just cruising through.

Carrjohn--you are no doubt a lucky one in their migration path! I'll have to look up where Kellyville is! Do you have lots of Zinnia and other BF plants for them?

I took my regular walk through the butterfly meadow today and counted 13 monarchs in 35 minutes. Not 'hundreds', but several more than last week when we would see maybe 4. I didn't see any milkweed in the so-called 'monarch meadow' and that may account for the low count. Quite an omission! (I'll have to scold the park 'naturalist' about that!)

I had 5 in my own garden at noon today, but I have tropical milkweed blooming (not native) and several other 'imports' that they like. That's a 'high' count for our front garden.

Yes, Tabasco, I have lots of zinnias. There are several other kinds of butterflies mixed in withe monarchs. If you notice in my first pic there is a cloudless in flight. The next pic is one that the name slips me. John

I counted 6 or 7 in the back yard a few minutes ago. 4 on one Dahlia plant, alone. They like the Dahlias when they are in the sun. Those in the shade get much less activity, warmer? It's 68 degrees now.
Andy P

Woe!!!!!!! I'm going to have to plant some Dahlias! I had no idea they were attracted to them.

We're seeing them coming through, but sparingly. It's early yet here. But I have those Monarch caterpillars to raise, so will be sending some out in the world when they're ready.

Those Monarchs enter dangerous territory when they visit my yard.
I have seven of these guys scattered about.
Andy P

Awesome shot Andy! You have some great Mantis photos. I haven't seen one around my yard this year. I'm enjoying yours vicariously. so keep the shots of them coming. :-) At least via photos here, my cats and butterflies will be safe! HAHAHA

Janet

Well, I think your mantis looks a very scary, and please keep them in your yard, thank you very much!

I have seen two in mine and both times they had one of my pretty monarchs in the clutches. Made me cry!

Early in the Summer I was taking a lot of shots of them, like a new baby, lol. Things settled down until this past couple of weeks when they got their wings. The shot above was taken yesterday in the Dahlias. I didn't post shots of the one in the Butterfly bush because this is the Butterfly forum. Tabasco would have been upset.
Today I found a pair mating, lots more pics.
I'll start a thread for the most recent shots in the Wildlife forum tomorrow.
Andy P

I do service work and travel through out the delmarva area and the numbers I see are rising daily
today prehaps 30 -35 in the maryland area around the chesapeake bay.
you can see them flying higher than normal not just around the flowering plants. in my yard may five or six a day. I will be tagging them as soon as more tags are available. Right now it looks like next august.
jim

This message was edited Sep 29, 2006 9:02 PM

here is a sample

and another

Johncarr, I believe that is a Gulf Fritilary on your Dahlia. They like my marigolds and Portulaca here.

Andy....I have a new Mantis pic I'll have to show you when it gets downloaded from the camera! Yours is cool - but I didn't know they were dangerous to butterflies!!!


~Sunny

bflybo--what a pretty pic of your monarch on the buddleia (I think).

I like your white buddleia--does it attract as many butterflies as the purple?

When you get your tags you will have to 'train' us on how to do it. It seems like it would hurt the BFs, but I guess not. People who get their monarchs 'found' on the other end really seem to have a lot of fun and I'd like to do it!

tabasco
This year the bfly's are more attracted to the white bush rather than to the purple most of the neighbors have purple as do I but the white this year is far busier whith all the bfly's.
the tagginbg program is on the [HYPERLINK@www.monarchwatch.org]

The Monarch count is down a bit today, only 3 or 4 at a time.
My Mantis count is up to 10 today. A second pair have been 'together' since I first spotted them around 10 AM, that's 5 hours.
I did start a thread in Wildlife. Much to my dismay there have been no responses. Well, it was exciting for me.
Andy P

Hi there :) Last Thursday and Friday (21st & 22nd) we were out running errands, mostly near the same N/S route that runs parallel to a major interstate (I-75). It seemed like the monarchs were following the path or something, I saw so many localized in that area. I thought perhaps they were drawn to the extra heat radiating off of the asphalt (?). We probably saw 25 total in the short times we were in the van driving from store to store. Maybe, around an hour in total van time, but we were not always paying attention to the monarchs the entire time. If we would've been sitting in one place near that monarch-busy road, I'm sure we could've counted a hundred in an hour. The most I saw traveling together was probably only 4, though. I've also noticed groups of 3 or 4 traveling through our yard, headed south. I've never seen or heard of anyone I personally know seeing them roost at night. That'd be awesome, wouldn't it? Definitely saw the most in the last week. Noticeably more than usual, with the peak being around the 21-23. Fun, isn't it? :)

Jacci

Interesting about the white buddleia. I have the 'honeycomb' (creamy ivory/yellow) and it is virtually ignored by all butterflies...I saw the white one in the nursery but passed it by but maybe I should take another look!

SalmonMe--Interesting about your BF count. I wonder too if it is the warm asphalt since it has been so cool lately. I saw a 'high' number for us last week but not many now, and no swallowtails to speak of. Our season is about over, I'm afraid, and the ones that are going South have moved on for the most part. But I am going to pay more attention to the Interstate flyways, now!

Andy--I will check out your pics on the Wildlife forum.

I have a dark purple and a honeycomb butterfly bush. The purple one attracts the most but the yellow one is still used. I had a white one last year but it was always the last choice. Go figure.

I would really love to see the groups of hundreds of Monarchs together. I think when I start hearing about them coming this year that I will drive towards Dallas (where I heard they were last year) and see if I can see them.

bflybo, are you tagging Monarchs that come into your yard or ones you are releasing? I've tagged my released one before but never tried to catch the ones in the yard. I probably could fairly easy sometimes because they will let me come right up next to them.

Tabasco, they are really easy to tag. The tags come with instructions how to do it, which is how I learned. You hold them by their top wings, so that they can't flap, and put the tag on the lower wing. http://monarchwatch.org/tagmig/tag.htm

The tags aren't cheap tho and I never need that many tags. I asked this year if anyone had any extra tags but no response. Maybe next year some of us could go in together and split the cost. ...I just checked and see that this year they have a "mini" set of 5 but it doesn't give a price. I need more than 5 but not 100.

Well, next year I will be interested in tagging, and maybe going in on a bunch of them.

But, I have to admit I just went for a Sunday butterfly walk with my DH today and saw about a hundred monarchs in a zinnia garden at our local farm market. I wish I had a set of tags for them. I could have had a ball!

So I guess the season isn't over here if you have Zinnias. The monarchs didn't seem to be interested in the Cosmos and other flowers (not especially butterfly flowers), but they were loving the zinnias.

A monarch stopping for lunch

And three nectaring on this zinnia...

Zinnias are THE BEST for attracting them. I wouldn't have near as many if it weren't for the zinnias.

Just joining you all here on this thread...I'm outside most of the day and I can count at least 2 dozen an hour floating in a southern direction. There's always a few to be seen on my property, but they are rarely staying around to feed right now...seem to be in a hurry to head on down the road.

We live in a mostly rural area for miles around and there's tons of natural attractors in the fields and road ditches at the moment.

I haven't kept count over the last few weeks, but seemed like numbers were higher over the past few days. It probably helps that temps have gone from the 60's to the 80's.

I'm waiting for them! I released 14 today. :) I have seen several mating couples the last few days so I'm hoping for a new crop of eggs soon!

I just release several Monarchs which I raised in a cage. The wasps in my area eat just about every caterpillar, so I try to raise as many as possible and then release them. Something I saw this week really surprised me .... I saw a Tiger Swallowtail that was flying really odd and then it landed hard on the ground. Upon examination, I witnessed a wasp on it's back stinging it! Of course, I chased the wasp away, but I think the damage had already been done to the poor swallowtail.

I wish I knew a good way to eliminate the majority of my wasp population. They eat almost 100% of the cats in my yard unless I get the cats before they do!

Two of the Monarchs landed on some of my milkweed and stayed there for about another hour before they flew off.

Very cool picture of them on the milkweed, Becky!

Yes, great shot! That's an awful story about the TST! I had no idea wasps would do that. I have a ton of red wasps and I know they eat my cats because they are always looking around. If I don't bring the eggs in I won't ever find babies. Same thing with the tons of spiders I have. I'm gardening for the butterflies organically but I'm having an overpopulation of predators!

A wonderful thread, tabasco ... I'm lurking in several threads, but will pipe up every now and again.

Some wonderful shots of the butterflies, folks !!

konkreteblond .. I too, have realized that this year has been gosh awful for all sorts (and vast #'s) of bugs and crawly critters .. that *I* know I've never-ever seen before!

And I truly believe that it has nothing to do with DG finally creating the BugFiles database! (Hee) However, in that respect - it seems that it's been a wonderful opportunity (to see such bugs), for quite a number of folks .. for pitter-taking & adding to the database. (lol)

In all my years .. the closest I've ever seen a hornet, was on a television nature program. Encountered my first Bald-faced Hornet only about 2 years ago. And then this year; my very first European Hornet. Several have enjoyed the hummer feeders just as much as the hummers. Oddly, they all respect each other 'space' too!

These days, on the zinnias .. are Sulphur and Skipper species that have never visited before. Just a matter of IDing them ...

- Magpye

The wasps are bad news for cats....they take them back to their nest for their young.

Great pics Becky

Here's my first 3 I raised and released today, it was so exciting.

Glad you enjoyed my photos. It's truly awesome to hear from others who enjoy the lovely Monarchs and even raise Monarch cats!

Congrats to fly-girl on your "firstborn" raise and release Monarchs! It's such a thrill, isn't it?!

I've actually seen a wasp lift a cat off of a plant and take it back to it's nest to feed it's young! Made me sick. I blast their nests down with the water hose. But they often come back or relocate to somewhere else in my yard. I, too, am trying to do pesticide-free organic gardening. I wouldn't mind a couple wasps, but they are all over my yard. No small insects survive the wasps scavanging for live food.

I've raised and released over 200 Monarchs during the past 2 years and it never ceases to thrill me every time I have one fly away off my hand. I marked some of them and low and behold they came back to my yard! Even laid eggs on my plants for the next generation. Always exciting!

This is a fun forum! Ya'll are great!

That's impressive! How did you tag them?

I used a black fine point permanent marker and put my initial (B) and a number on the bottom of one of the lower wings. I numbered each butterfly I released out of one batch. There were 18 total during that release. I wrote in a journal about each butterfly. When they emerged, male or female, and date released. I was curious to see if they would return. Several females did and I saw one male that may have decided on my yard as part of his territory.

I'm just really interested in Monarchs. I don't do the Monarch tagging, though. Several folks locally have asked me to get involved in the Monarch Watch official tagging, but I decided at this time I didn't want to spend the money on the tagging kits. So I just did it to track a group of Monarchs that I released last year. I haven't tagged anymore since. I found out what I wanted to know. Some do return to lay the next generation of Monarchs if you have healthy host plants available in your yard. That made me more determined to raise and release the cats I find in my yard.

Also of interest. On different occassions, two of the returning Monarchs would follow me around my yard when I was doing gardening. They even followed my son while he was mowing the yard one afternoon. And I actually had one that tried to get into my screened porch. Do you suppose they actually remembered me and knew I had host plants on my screened-in porch? I like to think so. I believe they are smarter than we may think.



This message was edited Oct 6, 2006 8:25 PM

Hi, becky--extremely fascinating about your monarch research and tagging program. Thank you for telling us about it.

When you say they 'returned' to your yard, how much time elapsed from their departure to their return? Are these monarchs that perhaps went to Mexico to overwinter?

It's also very interesting about your home grown monarchs following you around the yard. I think you are right--they do have some inborn 'memories' ...

Hi Tabasco! (Love your posting name, btw!)

The returning Monarchs were gone about a week. Being females, apparently they mated and then came back to my yard to lay their eggs. They hung around my yard until they probably died - about 12-13 days later. The "older" they are, the more frantic they are about laying their eggs. I found one of them dead in my garden. She looked "old". Wings were faded and worn and frayed. Made me kind of sad. I was used to seeing her every day and then she was no more! They usually live a maximum of 3 weeks as butterflies. But many are often killed by predators, cars, and pesticides, which greatly reduces their life span. Apparently, they were "safe" hanging around my yard, so they lived a "long" life. :-)