Date: 07/14/2011

Number: 1

Today (14 Jul 2011) at 5 PM there was one monarch in our extensive Buddleia garden. First seen in weeks....

I live in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Nelson Co. VA between Charlottesville and Lynchburg at 1500 feet elevation and my wife Linda and I have large Buddleia and perennial gardens. The plants are healthy, robust and blooming extensively as of this date, 12 July 2011.



In the past decade there have been dozens of swallowtails (Papilio philenor, glaucus, polyxenes, troilus) nectaring at this time. This year there are VERY few. Amazingly so.



I have both swamp and common milkweed (Asclepias syriaca and A. incarnata) growing in the garden, and so far this entire season we have seen very few monarchs and no immatures on the milkweeds. I did see one fresh monarch about a month ago, probably the offspring of an early summer wild female.



The question: what is happening??? Is this a natural synchronized population fluctuation, or is something more ominous occurring?

Roseland, VA

Latitude: 37.8 Longitude: -79

Observed by: Lincoln
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