Date: 09/06/2013

Number: 350

Yesterdays (6 Sept.) cool overnight temperatures, sunny sky and N-NWwind. Triggered the first noteable Monarch migration of the season at Monarch Landing (one mile east of Port Burwell-north coast, central basin-Lake Erie.). A fairly regular stream of Monarchs were pushed from the north and ended up below the cliff face, sheltered from the north wind and moving S-W along the north shore of Lake Erie. Ten minute counts, three times an hour averaged about a butterfly a minute, for about six hours so I estimated between 350 and 400 monarchs passed by Monarch Landing yesterday. Most of these did not stop ,and  these numbers, are very light for these dates and weather conditions (based on 16 years of counting at this location). However considering Monarch numbers over the season it is at least a flow heading to Mexico.

        Today (7 Sept.), with S-W breezes off the lake, Monarchs were above the cliff and more likely to stop to nectar on the goldenrod and liatris. I estimated a total of perhaps 250 Monarchs for the day.

Forwarded courtesy of Donald Davis.

Port Burwell, ON

Latitude: 42.6 Longitude: -80.8

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