Date: 02/09/2007

Number: 1

My daughter and I had been keeping track of three chrysalis at two different sites that we noticed in mid January. That week the temps were going to dip into the low 30's....so we placed some thermometers near the two sites. As far as we could tell, the "exposed" site's (where two of them were; one of them seemed to be more developed than any of the others since you could see some wing formation) lowest temp was 34 F (though with the wind and rain I feel it might have been colder). The second site's (where one chrysalis was) lowest temp was 38 F. The latter starting changing color after 4 days or so - but did not pop until 3 weeks later (after a couple of days in the 70's)...I actually caught this one on tape. We checked the ones at the "exposed" site - they had not changed at all in color nor wing development, nor did they change in the days to follow...so we assumed the cold temp had killed them. To our surprise yesterday we saw a monarch fluttering around the garden so we rushed to check the site and indeed both chrysalis had popped! So we were mistaken- these guys actually seem to be able to pause their development in response to the temperature (if you hadn't guessed already, we had a couple of nice days down here in Houston). So as far as this winter is concerned, our garden has been the 'nursery' for a total of 4 adult monarchs and there
are two more chrysalis on the way. The last caterpillar to change into
a chrysalis did so yesterday- this one amazed me because it kept eating away at the stems of a very dead looking milkweed!
The only other comment I have is that the adults have 'hung' out in the garden much longer than the ones I've seen in the past (during other
seasons)- they seem weak and unwilling to fly (not many flower around here right now). So I don't know if these will also go into some sort of dormancy until nectar becomes more available.

League City, TX

Latitude: 29.5 Longitude: -95.1

Observed by: katerina
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