Monarch Butterflies.

[bugmankeith]

Does anybody raise monarch butterflies, or plant milkweed for them? I see a few each year, but the area where the milkweed grows is constantly being chopped down.

I belong to a monarch website, and they said on rare occassions a monarch will be white, and sometimes instead of a green chrysalis, it will be orange!

 

[OldHag]

Every August for as long as I can remember, we have gathered caterpillars and raised them and let them go as butterflies. Ive never had an orange chrysalis or seen a white butterfly.
I have heard of white monarchs but haven't seen one.
I have noticed the last 10 yrs or so, the caterpillars have been harder to find. Dont know why. The milkweed is still abundant.... but..just dont see as many caterpillars as I did as a kid.

 

[lucanidae]

I have 4 caterpillars at the moment....they are all around here I just grab them as I see them.

 

[bugmankeith]

Cool, if you want you can post pictures of them here.

 

[dtknow]

I'm giving some milkweed a shot this year. Currently sprouted maybe 30 plants. Asclepias speciosa.

 

[bugmankeith]

I have butterfly milkweed (orange and red) and common milkweed (purple) growing.

 

[zinto]

I have noticed the last 10 yrs or so, the caterpillars have been harder to find. Dont know why. The milkweed is still abundant.... but..just dont see as many caterpillars as I did as a kid.

I was talking to my dad about this, and when he was a kid (60s), the monarchs butterfly was so abundant that they sold screens that you put on the front of your car so the butterfly wings wouldn't clog up your car. They have dramatically decreased in number...it's sad.

 

[luna]

Raising Monarchs is good summer fun



Just released a Monarch that I had been rearing this afternoon. I've gone to check on her a few times... still on the phlox where I left her. I've never posted pictures here before but maybe I'll figure it out later.

When we talk about not seeing as many moths and butterflies as before there are two things I think we need to consider.

Many of the host plants for the caterpillars and nectar plants for adults are considered weeds so they are not grown. In many cases these plants are aggressively eliminated. In places where you do not have food available, you will not have the organism.

People do not spend as much time outside. Today I may have spent a total of two hours outside and have seen half a dozen Monarchs. 20 years ago, it was probably five or six hours between gardening and field work and it would have been at least a dozen monarch on an August day. As a child... you only went home when your parents made/could find you... dozens crossed your path. More time out, more encounters.

Back to orginal question... I've seen hundreds of Monarch chrysalis but never an orange one. There was a new artcle on Yahoo last month with a picture they called a white monarch.

 

[bugmankeith]

Yeah I have the picture of the white monarch. I used to tag monarchs, and on average I would only see 8 or 9 a day...before that there used to be alot more but the town keeps chopping down the wild milkweed.

 

[zinto]

When we talk about not seeing as many moths and butterflies as before there are two things I think we need to consider.

Many of the host plants for the caterpillars and nectar plants for adults are considered weeds so they are not grown. In many cases these plants are aggressively eliminated. In places where you do not have food available, you will not have the organism.

People do not spend as much time outside. Today I may have spent a total of two hours outside and have seen half a dozen Monarchs. 20 years ago, it was probably five or six hours between gardening and field work and it would have been at least a dozen monarch on an August day. As a child... you only went home when your parents made/could find you... dozens crossed your path. More time out, more encounters.

Although it may be a possibility that the numbers have decreased due to aggressive elimination of host plants, they wouldn't be controlled in the wild. I don't feel that's going to have this large of an impact on these guys. As far as not spending time outside...I dunno, that one doesn't seem to make sense to me (sorry, not trying to be rude). The way my dad was describing it was that they were almost at pest status. They were a nuisance to car owners and trying to keep cars clean. I personally think there's something larger at work here. Pollution keeps getting worse...but who knows. I think it is just pretty obvious that numbers are indeed decreasing and the reasons are yet to be discovered. Just my opinion!

 

[bugmankeith]

Pollution could be a reason, and global warming.

 

[bugmankeith]

Here's a male monarch I saw resting in the forest, snapped a photo of him before he flew off.

 

[thisgal]

We have a mysterious batch of milkweed in our front yard that multiplies twofold each year. We don't know where it came from, and they refuse to die.

 

[8Pat]

Hi all!

Here in Quebec I'm seeing a lot of monarchs this year. They're a lot more abundant then the last couple of years. Usually notice them in August but we saw great numbers early in July.

I know they're having a hard time with habitat destruction all along their migration route but I thought you would like to know that here in Canada we're making an effort to produce these flamboyant butterflies!

Oh! And they make a great classroom project! I tried that a couple of times with my students. Kept the caterpillars in containers on the window. If we got lucky we could see the adult emerge from its chrysalis. They're a beauty!

Have a good day everybody!
Jean

 

[Elizabeth]

Reasons for their declining numbers:

http://www.monarchwatch.org/conserve/index.htm