I have a lot of vegetation around my house — including gardens that do not get weeded nearly enough. One result is I have a few milkweed plants growing around the house — and milkweed plants are what Monarch butterflies need for their caterpillar stage.
These plants are local ‘volunteers’ so they are appropriate for the landscape — and the local monarchs. I spotted the one above back in July, but there have been others from time to time. They definitely target milkweed. It’s one way to up your chances of having monarchs showing up around your yard. The monarch has quite a lifestyle. en.wikipedia.org/...
If all goes well within 2 weeks or so the caterpillars will pick a spot to attach, and contract into a pod called a chrysalis. (Moths do cocoons.) I haven’t spotted any yet, but here’s a video of it happening. You can see it pulling the striped skin up and dropping it off, leaving a much less conspicuous pupal form behind.
Here’s the followup video showing what happens about 9-10 days later. Monarch butterfly! It has to pump up those wings and let them harden before it can fly away.
Monarchs are famous for migration as well as their size and color. They travel across North America to winter in Mexico before starting back out in the spring — but they do it over the course of four generations. The monarchs of late spring and early summer are likely monarchs that have hatched out locally; it’s the ones you see in the fall that make the long journey south.
Monarchs are in trouble — their population is down by 90% in the last 20 years. The winter habit they need in Mexico is threatened by logging and climate change. Their 3,000 mile migration is threatened by the loss of milkweed due to the use of herbicides like Roundup on crops, and insecticides that kill the monarchs. Climate change may also be making milkweed change in ways that affect monarch health.
Planting milkweed is one way to help — but it has to be a native variety suitable for the locale. Here are some suggestions from the National Wildlife Federation. Planting other flowers can help monarchs as well; the adults feed on a variety. It’s their caterpillars that need milkweed.
I feel really fortunate to have captured this in my yard this year. Will that be possible in the future? Not a question I ever wanted to ask.
Here’s a couple of bonus pictures of another butterfly from my back yard. It’s called a White Admiral or Red Spotted Purple, assuming I’ve identified it correctly. It had gotten trapped in a green house and was still a bit groggy when I got it out, so I was able to get some good pictures.