August 17, 2016

Yesterday (August 16) I checked the status of the Monarch population at Lower Crab Creek. Unfortunately, the new generation of migrants has not yet emerged. They normally appear around August 12 but development of generations is slower this year because of the relatively cool June we experienced. However, I did expect migrants to have begun emerging by now. I will check the site again on Friday but doubt significant numbers will have appeared by then.

So I am postponing the Monarch tagging day to Saturday August 27. As long as something has not happened to caterpillar populations during the past month, I fully expect large numbers of migrant Monarchs to be present at Crab Creek on the 27th ! (but I’ve been wrong before…….)

If there is sufficient interest I will consider holding an additional tagging day on Wednesday August 24.

I will update the situation on Friday August 19

My apologies for the date change but nature and Monarchs have never been entirely predictable…..

August 19, 2016

A quick check of the Lower Crab Creek Monarch population today suggested that the new migrant generation has only just started emerging (just 2 fresh individuals seen)

Assuming larval survivorship has been good, we can expect good numbers of fresh Monarchs to be flying on Saturday August 27.

Monarch Tagging Cancelled for August 27

isappointingly, I am cancelling the proposed Monarch Tagging Day scheduled for Saturday 27 August….

Numbers of migrant butterflies at the site are too low to make tagging a realistic and viable goal.

The expected generation of migratory Monarchs has begun emerging but in very low numbers. Instead of an expected 20-30 butterflies seen at the site per hour, there are only 5 per hour and only half of these are migrants. I do not expect this situation to change dramatically during the next week or so.

Clearly, the mortality pressure on developing eggs, caterpillars and pupae during the past month has been considerable. We know that substantial numbers of eggs were laid by the substantial summer generation of adults. We can only speculate on what happened to them during development. The most likely explanation is high mortality during the egg and early caterpillar stages. Ants and spiders usually eat a lot of these stages and perhaps the numbers of ants and spiders were extra high this year? I don’t think weather was a problem with no periods of sustained heat.

I apologize on behalf of Mother Nature for this disappointing news! With the Good Mother’s cooperation we will plan to hold this event in August 2017

Despite this setback, numbers of Monarchs overall in the west do appear to be on an upward trajectory and if this is sustained it can only be a matter of time before we have hundreds of Monarchs at Crab Creek to tag!