Where was the migration strongest?
How many monarchs per hour did each person see? You can compare the observations below by looking for two things:
- The number of monarchs the person saw and
- The number of minutes (or hours) the person was watching.
September
11: Queens, New York (41
N, -74 W)
Sixteen Monarchs
have passed by at 300 - 400 feet altitude in only 15 minutes starting
at 1:05PM. I am on the 28th floor at about 350 feet. Some are flying very
energetically, some are drifting. Winds are favorable for a southern trek
down 3rd Avenue.
September
6: Fort Wayne, Indiana (41 N, -85 W)
I saw my first monarch of the season on Sat., Sept 6 around 2:00 pm. It
was flying alone and headed south.
September
7: Midland, Michigan (44 N, -84 W)
On Sunday I went out to Chippewa Nature Center’s two new
fields of milkweed and wildflowers for three hours and saw 27
fresh monarchs on the move. I netted and tagged seven butterflies, four
males and three females.
September
9: Prairie City, Iowa (41 N, -93 W)
This was a wonderful day for observing migrating monarch butterflies.
On Monday, their movement had been dampened by rainy weather, but things
changed. This day began with temperatures across central Iowa in the low
40s, but the sunny weather stirred up monarch movement once again. In
the mid-afternoon at Neal Smith National Wildlife Refuge, during
two hours of observations we counted the largest total yet for this fall--545
monarchs. In the first 30 minutes, we counted about 250 monarchs
nectaring on tickseeds in the northern edge of the refuge. What
a delight to see them racing here and there over the wildflowers.
September
10: Aubrey, Texas (33 N, -97 W)
Seeing an average if 1-2 monarchs per day flying through
on clear days in north Texas.
September
10: Point Lepreau, New Brunswick (45 N, -66
W)
This afternoon, I stopped in at Point Lepreau with the
hope today’s strong westerly winds might have blown some inland
Monarchs to the Bay of Fundy coast. I wasn’t disappointed. I didn’t
see a single Monarch until about 1:30 PM when I arrived at the very tip
of Point Lepreau, which is the usual accumulating spot when conditions
are right. I immediately began seeing Monarchs nectaring on the thistle,
goldenrod and asters that bloom in profusion near the bird observatory.
I would estimate I saw between 200 and 300 Monarchs during the
three hours I was there and caught and tagged 78, which is the
best one-day total I’ve done in the three years I’ve been
tagging. While I was taking butterflies out of the net a constant trickle
of them was passing, all headed southwest, into the teeth of the wind.
(Source: Monarch Watch)
- You can find all observations reported this week in the sightings database and on the migration maps.
For Your Journal: Each week, choose your favorite monarch sighting and record your thoughts in your journal. >>