Date: 10/03/2010

Number: 3000

October 13
After enjoying the monarchs fluttering and roosting around town the last few weeks, I only saw one monarch butterfly on Wednesday. It appears that the peak migration is over and only a few stragglers will be fluttering through town now. The winds have been calm the last few days and a cool front was coming down from the north so it must have been a perfect time for the monarchs to continue their migration. They were wonderful little visitors and I look forward to them visiting again next year

October 5
There was a bit of a southern breeze when I went by the city cemetery to check for overnight roosts this morning at about 8am. My car dashboard said it was 57 degrees outside when I pulled up to the oak trees the monarchs seem to favor and there they were! Thousands of monarchs on the north side of 8 of the cemetary's oak trees. They were beautiful! I'll keep ya'll posted on their migration progress.

October 3
Today we went to the cemetery where we have seen monarchs roosting the past 2 years and sure enough, there were thousands of them roosting on some of the oak trees around the cemetery! I had seen some monarchs around town the last several days, but wasn't expecting to see so many already. We just had our first cold front blow through on Wednesday and Thursday so it must blown the monarchs down too. I'll keep checking the next several weeks and keep updating Journey North.

Editor’s Note: We are estimating 3000 monarchs based on observer’s estimate of “thousands” and based on the dense clusters shown in these pictures.

I went by the cemetery this morning (10/05) about 8am to check on the overnight roosts and there were large roosts on the north side of 8 different oak trees. There was a bit of a southern breeze this morning and my dashboard said the outside temp was 57 degrees. As I type this I've been seeing monarchs fluttering around my neighbors trees and flying by my storm door. It's been very fun observing them!

Rankin, TX

Latitude: 31.3 Longitude: -102

Observed by: Nikki
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