I adopted 50-60 Monarch cats .....

We discovered this week in our garden at school there was a Monarch caterpillar population explosion! So much so that they have eaten down about 20-30 milkweed plants in a short one week period. So ..... Spring Break is coming up next week and we knew the cats would starve soon. So we called teachers at other schools and had some takers come over to adopt a bunch of our cats, but we still had sooooo many left. So I gave in and adopted the remaining 50-60 cats of all instars sizes and brought them home today. I should have taken a photo of all of them piled in a small container to transport, but was in a hurry after work due to another commitment, so didn't get a chance. It was rather amazing to see that many cats crawling around in a little 6" X 6" cube. LOL! Took me a good 15 minutes to collect them all! Students were coming by to see what I was doing and freaked out to see so many cats in one container. LOL! They all thought it was way cool! We have a lot of kids that want to take some home, but I had to explain to them that they need a specific kind of plant to eat. (Which of course they didn't have at their homes.) I saw a female again in our garden today laying more eggs. Will it ever end????!!! LOL!

This message was edited Mar 23, 2007 9:43 PM

Oh .... and I am babysitting 2 Gulf Fritillary cats and one G.F. chrysalis for my classroom. The little girl in my class who we call the "caterpillar momma" took some home as well. She has her own little cage and I gave her another one of my potted milkweed plants (that is small) with 3 of the large Monarch cats on it. Hopefully, they will go into the chrysalis stage soon. I told her and her older sister to call me if they eat the plant down. Their mom or dad can bring them by my house and I'll give them another plant. lol She takes her momma job VERY seriously. She checks them constantly and has really sharp eyesight and can see things I can't see. She never ceases to astonish us with her eagle eyes and knowledge! She loves her cats and butterflies! :-) :-) :-) :-) I promised her some seeds for this summer to start either her own little garden in her yard or in a container. I'm going to give her all butterfly host plants. She's very excited about that! :-)

Becky...

Congrats...and nope, it never ends :o) Gotta love it!!!

Isn't it wonderful to know we change people's awareness of butterflies and caterpillars. That little girl is something else!!! Bet you won't catch any little neighborhood boys trying to squish a bug when she's around :o)

The Monarchs haven't started laying eggs that I know of...I don't even want to look at the milkweeds!!! Got my hands full with the Pipevine Swallowtails and Black Swallowtails.

~ Cat

I thought I saw a Monarch here the other day. But it flew away so fast! Ha! Bet you've got eggs on your milkweed, Cat! I don't normally get spring Monarch cats, but will check today, anyway.

Becky, you poor dear woman! The cat rearing season has started early for you! Good thing you have a great helper.

Do you have enough mw?

Thanks, fly_girl! Yes! Currently I do have plenty of milkweed. It's just that my plants were cut back to just above the ground a couple months ago. They are short and bushy right now. lol

Wow! I think I can hear the Chomp,Chomp,Chomp of the Monarch milkweed mowing machine all the way over on this coast.Those guys will wipe you out by the end of next week.You'll be back to stems only. All I can say is I feel your pain.They are really laying eggs over here too.I'm taking all the 4th and 5th instar and putting them on the strangler vine and letting them survive on their own.I've got to have 60 or 70 1 and 3 gallon pots of MW and that's not enough to keep up.It's just Milkweed Madness !!!
Becky that's gotta be really rewarding to have a girl that interested in butterflys.But you have to take some of the credit to have inspired her,Way to go girl !!!!
P.S.If you run low on seed just yell

Don

Don, LOL! Milkweed Madness! I like that! LOL!

I still have lots of seeds that I harvested a few months back. I've been giving it away in swaps and in my Christmas cards this past year and at the school and well..... just about everywhere! LOL I have over 100 plants in my yard but they are ALL little short bushy plants from the hard pruning I did. I put all the cats on milkweed in pots in my wagon in the backyard. Looked at them before dark and boy, are they chowing down. By tomorrow morning there won't be much of those 8 plants left. I am going to put a couple plants in a cage and grab the largest cats and put them inside the cage with the hopes that they are about ready to morph. And the rest I will disperse around the yard onto other MW plants. I have enough for this batch of cats. But future cats ..... the milkweed better grow new leaves fast! LOL!

Thanks for your offer of seeds! I have plenty and my milkweed comes right back after they are stripped by the cats. It's gonna be another busy year of butterfly rearing. But now I have not only my own yard but the garden at school. Ooooh, boy! I need a couple acres of milkweed plants for sure! LOL!

Here's a photo this morning of the Monarch cats after they have chewed down the Milkweed plants in a day and a half. They are all looking pretty big, so will probably move them to a cage today with some more potted MW. I've got some chyrsalis already hanging in the cage, so will have to move them all to the "nursery" cage soon! :-)

I will release some at the school and some at my house. Since the Milkweed is pretty much gone at the school, the butterflies won't hang around there. But they might at my yard as I still have plenty of MW in my yard.

Another photo showing 3 cats on one stem. No Leaves, mind you! I guess they were having a pow-wow! lol

I released the last of the Monarch butterflies today. I think it totaled 39. Several of the cats died for whatever reasons. Probably a cat virus because they turned black or died while hanging in a J. But the rest flew off to freedom! I released 22 all at once yesterday. Now that was a sight to see! Sorry I didn't get any photos. I just decided to enjoy them flying away without the distraction of trying to snap photos. I love that gliding that they do while flying.

I have two that seem to be hanging around my yard for the past couple of days. I think they have decided to stay and make my yard their home and raise a family here. I am thrilled to have them grace my yard every day!!! :-) :-) :-)

Wow, 22 at once! How exciting! Doesn't it just make you smile when they fly off? I love that!

WTG Becky!!!

Rox - The funny part was when I went out to my porch where the butterfly cage was and startled all of them and they started flying frantically around inside the cage. The entire cage looked like it was in motion and might possibly lift off the ground from all the fluttering wings! You can actually hear the flutter of butterflies! It's really neat! I raised 18 through their life-cycle in a cage one cold winter and that sound always delights me. They would get excited to see me because they knew I was going to feed them a small dish of Gatorade-soaked kleenex. They would try to be the first one to perch on my arm as I placed the dish in the cage. Must be a territorial thing! LOL!

I've got 37 cats and some are reaching the continuous eating phase (eat-'til-you-pupate). I haven't seen any more eggs, at least. But I plan to buy a couple more milkweeds next week, because food is getting a bit low for them. Meanwhile, the Monarchs are still coming through the general area in small numbers.

FINALLY had a Monarch visit today. Don't think it laid any eggs though. But it was nice to see one.

Wow, Linda! You are going to have fun releasing the butterflies in a couple more weeks!!

Yay, Karen!!!! Don't worry, you'll probably start seeing more and more. I hope all the neighbors using pesticides doesn't reduce your variety and population of butterflies and hummers this year. I wished I had about 5 acreas somewhere with a house right smack dab in the middle. That way I wouldn't have to worry about the neighbors using lawn pesticide services. Have you tried talking to them about the Hummers. (I know many folks don't much care for "bugs", but they might be more willing to change for the beautiful hummingbirds!)

I am sure they all consider me a nut for being so ecology minded. They just don't give a darn