Monarch's Galore

Last year we didn't get Monarch's till very late...like end of August......this year we have loads of them.

This is similar to my view of my poor milkweeds. I've got 3 which i put in recovery because they are completely defoliated thanks to the appetite of the blubber monsters..hehehe. I still love them but I hope that the plants will come back. I'll hate to see them die on me. :(

Here is another view of the horror/miracle/ anyone wants caterpillars???

Roly, yes, they are putting "a hurtin" on this plant, it's about 5 feet tall and 3 feet around. With as many as there are, ( and I have about 20 in cages too) cause I thought Gee, if's it's like last year, there won't be many........Wrong ! and I'm glad of it. I've got several more plants in the ground, and some smaller ones "hidden away" just in case, as when these guys get done, I don't want them to leave, so will bring out the back up's then.
I'm very excited since last year was fairly dismal for Monarch's.

Yikes! I've milkweeds galores awaiting for the monarch, and there is none here. Still waiting, I wished I could help out those that needs MW to feed your cats.

That is a great site! I know you are stressed with the over abundance, but nice to know they are rebounding after last year.

Yup, the plant is getting rather sparse, and they are laying more eggs, I just gave the smaller milkweed's a shot of fertilizer so speed things up a bit !

Is there an alternative to milkweed??? All 6 of my plants are completely eaten away. Most of the caterpillars pupated. At least I found 6 chrysalids today but there is a smaller one that I'm trying to nurse in the few leafs that are left at the top of one of the milkweeds. HD doesn't get any more until Tuesday and the seedlings are only 1 week old.

There are several kind of MWs, and I'm trying to plant a few variety. My best bet is allowing my seedpods to disperse their seeds for future generations (seasons) of growth. Sort of like accumulative wealth. Some of mine that piggy-bagged other tropical plants inside the gh over winters, they're matured now and begun to make seedpods. Roly, I know I didn't answer your question. Hopefully others can help out?

Well I'm happy to inform you guys that I've got 7 Monarch chrysalids and it seems as if my Black Swallow Tails are starting to find a spot to pupate as well. I'm soo thrilled both because my milkweeds and dills will get a break and because soon I'll have more beautiful butterflies in my garden.

Roly...in FL and TX we can never plant too many MW plants. I over wintered some this last winter so I have had adult plants all year. I won't hesitate to do it again this year. I put them in the wood shop with daylight neon bulbs. I even had citrus trees inside blooming in the winter for the GSTs.
Glad you have them going to chrysalis...nothing is more flustrating than watching cats with no food.

I'm so glad I found this thread. I have 2 MW plants that are about 4' tall, and I recently noticed a bunch of yellow eggs at the tips of the plants, near the blooms. I am new to butterfly gardening, so at first I thought the eggs were some type of pest. Then I saw the baby caterpillars all over the place so everything started to click.

I have a question, though. I see fire ants near both the eggs and caterpillars- they're just moving around from place to place and not harming anything from what I saw but I could be wrong. Are the fire ants bad in this situation? I can easily see the ants swarming on one of the cats.

Fire ants are bad news period! I can't tolerate them for their bite really painful--for us let along the poor caterpillars. I'd find way to protect my Monarch's caterpillars that's for sure.

I know ants and aphids have an intimate relationship, they mutually benefit one another, the ants feeds on the sticky substance the aphids secret, in turn the ants help protect the aphids in some way. But I only noticed that with Argentina ants, I don't have any knowledge about the fire ants, other than those ants are nastyyyyyyy biters. We need others' advise here.

22 chrysalis in the Caterpillar hotel. Last count on cat's on the plants was 36, ( the other day), many have gone to chrysalis...I'll get some pics. computer was down and had to go over to my son's house to use his.

Way to go mjs!! Sorry about the puter...but where there is a will there is a way!

Living in Florida the fire ants are a major nuisance. I have learned that they will sometimes help. They aerate soil and kill many nuisance pests.(fleas,grubs,cockroaches,ticks, and others) I have had mounds at the foot of some plants and not had a problem. There are pastey type products that you can put around the base of the plant that will deter them. If you must get rid of them I use a bait to get into the mound. Hope this helps.

With the horses and garden's , I have a company come in and treat the entire property ( 11 acre's) twice a year for the fire ant's. They come out with a four wheeler and drums' on either side and put down fire ant bait. Doesn't bother beneifical insects, and is very effective. No way could I control them otherwise. The company that does it also leaves us a container of extra bait in case we have a few stray hill's. I've "forgone" the treatment a few times and regretted it. There's no way I could treat the entire property like they do for the money.

I sure hope you do the treatments at the time when butterflies aren't active. I hate the ants so I do spray the nests when I locate them. One today had made it's way inside of a large lawn ornament frog that had a broken toe.

Sheila, we do it in March /October., but it wouldn't hurt the Butterflies, it is not absorbed by the plants. The (ant) worker's carry the bait into the nest, and it's fed to the Queen.The only other insect it bothers ( and not that much) is Mole Cricket's. The bait causes them to be Sterile as well as kill them.
Other insects don't bother with it.

Oh, so it is solids and not a spray...that is better.

Yes, It's a pellet.

I still have tons of seeds if anyone wants any.

No problem! Can you send me your address again?

here's the one's I've got in the cage...on one side,
Next pic is in the opposite corner.
this is in addition to all the ones that were out on the plants !
whoo hoooooo !

there's a few in the other corner too, but I it was too hard to get that pic...

mj! Way to go! Congrats to your success!!! WOOOOHOOOOOO!!!! Cheer!

Lily,
I'm really happy about this....last year I was beginning to think that we weren't anywhere near the "Monarch Radar" !

Way to go!!!! That is super, I love seeing the possibilities of egg laying hanging there.

If you want to have some fun, you can sex them in the chrysalis! The female has a little indentation line near the dots my the creamaster.
I will find a link that shows it....brb.

Ok....Here is a link that tells how to determine the sex in a Monarch chrysalis, complete with picture.
http://melanys.tripod.com/monarch.htm

This message was edited Jul 15, 2010 5:42 PM

That's a lot of chrysalids !!! Your garden will be full of gorgeous butterflies in a bit over a week or so. I bet it will be a beautiful site. I have about 8 of the monarchs and 3 Black Swallowtails. Any idea how long do the BST take to eclose??

Roly,
Last year we let the BST's wander our front screened porch. We put 3 huge plants of Dill/Fennel/Parsley ( kinda like a BF Buffet ! ) well, several made their chrysalis in some weird spots, and I had two that didn't eclose for 3 months !

here's one on a bird house my D's SO built that I liked too much to put outside, so it sit's on the porch ....
We didn't get as many this spring, but I've seen alot of them around and I've got ton's of Fennel so I think we'll have a nice crop of them too !

That's a lot of Black Swallowtails !!!! Is that from this year??? 3 months you said ???? That's a lot of waiting but patience I've got plenty of.

Roly, no those were last year. This year I had all my Fennel/Dill/Parsley in big pots under our Ligustrums. I let them stay out side. I've got 9 pots out there now that are re sprouting ! And lots of Eastern Black Swallowtails flying around.

This is just so cool! ^_^

In the spring my BST usually take from 12-15 days, but as the last ones come in the late summer I have had some that over-winter. If you keep chrysalis inside this presents a problem because they will not have the temps to indicate it is freezing outside. So make sure you put the cage on a patio or somewhere that they can judge the time of year and conditions.

Ah, thank for the tip Sheila, I've one BST cat indoor, which I thought tried to pupate yesterday. But it woke up and ate during the night? I may need to move it back out to the back porch.