Date: 10/07/2011

Number: 100

My friends and I went hiking at Lake Lewisville Environmental Learning Area today. Though we saw a steady sprinkling of flying monarchs in our 4 1/2 hour walk, we were astounded to stumble on two areas where monarchs were congregating in large numbers and clinging to branches, tree trunks, leaves and sticks. In those areas, there were probably at least 100 monarchs at each. We watched, filmed, photographed and stayed a while, but did not see them using any of the nearby flowers. They seemed to be resting and flying, but not eating. Both areas were wooded and shady with water or damp areas nearby. They used about 15 different plants to sit on, with no apparent preference.

Near one of the areas, Mikania scandens was blooming like crazy, but there were no monarchs on it. They were also not using the smartweed, goldenrods, eupatoriums, pluchea, grindelia, or other flowers that we could see.


It was an interesting day!

Courtesy of Mike Quinn

Dallas, TX

Latitude: 32.8 Longitude: -96.8

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