JULY 5, 2024 Released Monarch butterfly #1 on the deck this afternoon. The daily temperature has risen to 78 degrees for the first time this season. Cooler along the coast this close to the ocean might explain the delay in Monarch activity. This season I will bring in and feed the caterpillars inside the house.
July 7, 2024 Monarch butterfly #2 has emerged from its chrysalis. Wild release #2 today.
August 19, Wild release #3 with another two caterpillars nearing their next metamorphic stage. The plan to feed these caterpillars requires several trips each day to harvest milkweed leaves for their growth. This is not sustainable. It is possible only because I'm retired.
August 20, Chrysalid #4 formed today. No sign of the parasitic tachinid flies so far this season. I am optimistic that survival to the butterfly stage will increase this season.
August 21, chrysalid #5 formed today.
August 22, 20249:40 am Caterpillar 6 beginning J stage today (see photo below).
10:05 am Caterpillar 6 is now a chrysalid. Harvesting milkweed is no longer necessary at least for the next few weeks as I do not see any new caterpillars.
Ahh… Yosemite, one of my favorite places, where you can enter a rainbow.
The best way into Yosemite Valley is through the tunnel, an experience described by some as akin to being born.
"A long dark tunnel, with a far away bright light, which after a moment appears to grow larger... and larger until you burst through into a bright and beautiful place that other's say: "Looks like heaven."
Slow down as you exit the tunnel to turn left into the view point parking lot, where my students often took their first group photo (with Bridalveil Falls in the background.
Then drive on to the Yosemite Valley Visitor Center where, Park Rangers will provide maps and up to date information. It's a great place to start your visit.
Also on this map, the Ahwahnee Hotel which has a wonderful breakfast at a reasonable price in a national historic site. Charming when you look out to find deer grazing just a few feet away.
The 1.5 mile hike to the Vernal Fall Footbridge usually takes one to one and a half hours. For the 2.4 mile hike to the top of the Vernal Fall count on roughly 3 hours. Experiencing the Mist Trail is worthy of the time and effort. Take a rain poncho, the “mist” is sometimes thick.
I’d walk students through the Mist Trail rainbow, a vivid memory, the mist and rainbow colors, to last a lifetime.
"The tide teaches us to live with mystery and complexity. It lives in the body of a mud shrimp, signaling when to swim and when to burrow. It lives in sandpipers, crabs, and whelks. It lives in the spirit of bores, in the prayers of monks. The tide is vibration, music, time." —Jonathan White, Tides: The Science and Spirit of the Ocean
Waiting for Doc to answer the door, I knock again, but the timing is off (about 80 years.) He's not here, but I more clearly imagine Ed Ricketts and John Steinbeck just inside.
Teaching biology has so many wonderful parts like when students are able to connect the dots, especially when two seemingly different worlds collide. The worlds of literature and biology.
My favorite biologist, Ed Ricketts, and my favorite novelist, John Steinbeck, spent some of the richest moments of their lives, here just inside this door at 800 Cannery Row in Monterey California. Here is where they planned their expedition to the Sea of Cortez.
Image credit: Jeffrey M. Banister, Journal of the Southwest, Vol. 62, Number 2, Summer 2020
You are in a position to help save Monarch Butterflies from extinction! To begin, click on the 4 minute video below(best viewed full screen).
Since the 1990's there has been an 80% decline
in the Central Monarch population. (Zone B below)
Since the 1980's, the Western Monarch population
has declined by 99%. (Zone A below)
How you can help.
Plant native milkweed in your yard or in containers 12" in diameter, smaller pots, will do. Since I've not had any success with native milkweed, I've grown tropical milkweed instead, but it has to be cut back to 4 inch stalks around December 31st or they become a grave danger to future generations of monarch butterflies. (scroll down for explanation). It should also be mentioned that when your new tropical milkweeds are mature enough, the seed pods must be harvested and composted in order to prevent the seeds from spreading in the wild which could be disastrous. (scroll down for explanation).
Follow the steps below and grow your own milkweed butterfly forest.
Step 1: I drop about 30 seeds into a glass of water to soak overnight or two, which might shorten germination time. Once under ground, it took 17 days for these seeds to germinate. (That was 3 years ago). This year the seeds sprouted in 7 days. (see Figure 2)
Figure 1
Figure 2 Topical milkweed sprouts September 23, 2003
Why we have to harvest and compost
tropical milkweed seedpods and cut back
tropical milkweed plants to 4 inches by December 31st.
Click on the PBS video below.
Ophryocystis elektroscirria, is a protozoan (single celled) organism that infects monarch butterflies when they land on infested tropical milkweed. It accumulates on next season's tropical milkweed if not cut back in January.
Ophryocytis elektroscirria (
OE)
, first grows on tropical milkweed then infects monarch larvae. (scroll down to OE). Because tropical milkweed grows year round, the
concentration of OE on subsequent milkweed seasons increases the infection rate on Monarch butterflies. Native milkweed dies back during the winter.
When monarch butterflies land on second season tropical milkweed, they pick up OE which infects their offspring.
OE damage takes place during the chrysalid stage.
(S
ee Figure 3)
While the infected monarch adults do not survive to migrate, they do spread the protozoan parasite.
Vigilant
FIGURE 3 SIGNS OF OE INFECTION:
SPORES SEEN AS DARK PATCHES IN A MONARCH BUTTERFLY CHRYSALIS
OE damage takes place during the chrysalid stage. While the infected adults do not survive to migrate, they do spread the protozoan parasite. If you see the sign of infection above, keep this butterfly isolated when it emerges.
Here's an interesting way to attract butterflies to your garden
Everest never saw the mountain and never visited the area, but the mountain was given a colonial name without the consent of the Nepali people.
Nor was Edmund Hilary the first to climb Sagarmatha.
wiki In November 2020, Nepali politicians claimed China had annexed more than 150 hectares of Nepal land. The Nepali government in September 2021 formed a team
This team submitted its report on 26 September which brought the conclusion of claim being truth. It suggested making a joint force for dispute resolution. In early 2022, a Nepali government report was leaked. The report indicated the previously alleged buildings were on Chinese side, but found that China has built fences, a canal, and a road that encroached on Nepali soil.[20]
Sagarmatha (Everest) borders China and Nepal. From it's highest point, the southern slope in Nepalese, the northern Chinese. This view from the south shows the Nepalese view of Sagarmatha.
Figure 2: Tenzing Norgay, the first to climb Sagarmatha (Everest).
Sunday, September 24 Today a female monarch butterfly is on the dockside tropical milkweed laying eggs and sipping nectar from the blossoms. I haven't seen one in over a month.
Here's an interesting way to attract butterflies to your garden.
by Walter Reeves of the Atlanta Botanical Garden.
Saturday, September 23. Diez y Ocho has become a chrysalid.
Friday, September 22, Wabi Sabi: What I learned from the butterfly that could not fly.
I learned today that as Scott mentioned, Wabi Sabi's affliction was caused by OE, as shown in PBS Deep Look.
Click HERE for a superb explanatory video. It dramatically makes the case for the proper management of tropical milkweed: 1.harvest, and compost the seed pods before they open and 2. Trim milkweed down to 4 inches in January so they don't concentrate OE spores to next season's butterflies. By the way, if you have caterpillars, they will eat the seed pods too.
Sunday, September 18 Monarch caterpillar (Diez y Ocho) brought in for protection hopefully before tachinid flies have laid their eggs.
Sunday, September 10 About 30 milkweed seeds have sprouted in just 6-7 days.
Saturday, September 9 Ten milkweed seeds have sprouted.Wabi Sabi has emerged from her chrysalis but her legs are too weak to hold on to her perch as a result of OE.
Photo credit: Senka Dorn
Friday, Sept. 8 Scott volunteers to take home the most recent chrysalid for release in his neighborhood.
When wings are visible in the chrysalid, the butterfly will emerge within 24 hours.
Sunday, September 3 Chrysalid #5 is in its 3rd day.
Saturday, September 2. a. planted 50 tropical milkweed seeds in a sprouting tray. b. 6th caterpillar, the stowaway, (length 3cm) has died (cause unknown).
Friday, September 1, 2023 5th caterpillar entered chrysalis stage today. Let's call her Cinco.
Wednesday, August 30, Tachinid flies are formidable predators, causing four of the five Monarch caterpillars in the vivarium to perish as of today. Five tachinid fly larvae descended from the fourth monarch caterpillar today. I'd hoped to have brought them inside (out of predatory danger) but these energetic flies had already deposited eggs on the 4 caterpillars I'd brought in, yielding a 100% Monarch mortality rate mentioned previously.
A sobering calculation: 5 fly larvae emerged from a single monarch caterpillar. Each fly will mature into an adult fly in few days, say 1 week when they will mate and go on to deposit eggs on unprotected caterpillars contributing to a staggering fly population increase that explains the 100% mortality rate as of today.
It is easy to take sides as these ecological relationships unfold (I'm working for more Monarch Butterflies.) If anyone has ideas on how to suppress this fly predation, we'll be able to release more Monarch butterflies into the wild. Perhaps these butterflies will migrate to a location with fewer predatory flies.
Tuesday, August 29 of the vivarium six, 1 caterpillar (A) fatality (tachinid) today. The four remaining larvae are simultaneously briefly and unexpectedly pausing their feeding behavior (all are still). (B) missing one antennae is now 10:39 am) on the netted vivarium "ceiling". Is it ready for it's chrysalid stage? No. It has descended back to the wooden deck. 10:45 am now back to the ceiling. 10:50 now at leaf level. 10:53 now at bottom.
Monday, August 28, 2023 Monarch caterpillar census 10 (five on the deck, six in the vivarium). The 6th, too small to be noticed, maybe 1st or 2nd install, was a milkweed stowaway. Idea: this larva too young to be parasitized? Only 5 seeds sprouted from the 40 tropical milkweed seeds from 2021. From a late start*, caterpillar activity is back in full swing.
*Later start because of wet winter, and/or cooler temperature?
Tuesday July 25, 2023 A. I found a monarch caterpillar today on the soil near the base of a tropical milkweed on the front deck (south long planter.) B. Also, planted (in a 4"X10"tray) 40 seeds originally collected between November and December 2021. C. Milkweed trimmed down to 3inches on the south side of the house have not yet come back. 4 containers of tropical milkweed (on or adjacent to the deck) are growing fast.
Photo Paul Ho
Sunday, July 23 Paul has 20 monarch caterpillars in Zone 3. They are eating milkweed faster than the plants can grow.
See photo -->
How many caterpillars are in this photo?
Friday, June 23, 2023 5th straight day of sunshine. Paul (Zone 3 on the map) reports that his first monarch caterpillar has just gone to chrysalis stage. Let's check where he is on the map. I bet it's warmer in Zone 3.
Tom and Virginia(Zone 2) report they've spotted monarch adults in the last few weeks, but none seen here is South Laguna. Only 1 butterfly sighting (laying eggs) here in Zone 1 but I only found 1 egg.
Wednesday June 21 Third sunny day in a row following 9 weeks without sunshine here in Laguna Beach, which may explain why we haven't seen monarch butterflies as of this date.
Milkweed has sprouted from last seasons trimmed 3 inch stalks. (See Figure 1 below). So there is plenty of food when they arrive.
Almost Season 3.
Wednesday, Feb. 1, 2023 I have trimmed last season's tropical milkweed down to about 3 inches from the ground. This will reduce Monarch butterfly exposure to the fatal disease known as OE Ophryocystis elektroscirria (See Figure 2 below) Click HERE for more.
Spring temperatures are a few weeks away but good news has been published.(See Winter Count below)
FIGURE 1. If you haven't topped your tropical milkweed, this is a good time to do it to protect next seasons monarch butterflies from OE. Ophryocystis elektroscirria, a protozoan (single celled) organism infecting monarch, queen and lesser wanderer butterflies that scientists believe evolved alongside monarchs.
OE damage takes place during the chrysalid stage. While the infected adults do not survive to migrate, they do spread the protozoan parasite. If you see the sign of infection above, keep this butterfly isolated when it emerges, Place milkweed florets with blossoms to feed the isolated adult.
To control the dangerous spread of Ophryocystis elektroscirrha (OE), a parasite that infects monarch butterflies, I have cut my tropical milkweed plants down to 4 inch stems without leaves. (see photo below)
OE is a single-celled organism, a protozoan whose spores rest dormant on Asclepias curassavica (tropical milkweed), a fast growing, non-native plant favored by monarch butterflies and their larva. Click HERE for more about O.E. By cutting these milkweed plants, the protozoan parasites residing on the foilage are completely eliminated. When new leaves appear in spring, they are free of the parasites that have been linked to lower monarch migration success, reduction in body mass, mating success, lifespan, and ability to fly.
July 7, 2024 Monarch butterfly #2 has emerged from its chrysalis. Wild release #2 today. 
