Date: 09/23/2014

Number: 1

Released Monarch#6 at "Friends Of Riverside Park Garden in Moline, IL. The female named "The Miracle Monarch" is my final for the season. In the presence of 10-15 fellow Monarchs clustering nearby. Released in Memory of All those Monarchs we lost this year from OE Disease or other Accidents along the way. I named her because the day I found her was by accident I picked a leaf for a Cat to eat and when I flipped it over I observed what looked like an egg with a black line in it. It turned out being a hatching egg, what are the chances of that? Then when in a longer time than expected Chrysalis stage it appeared the process would not be successful and a strange phenomena occurred, I can't explain, and the Chrysalis turned black and eclosed into a beautiful Monarch.

9/20/14 Miracle or Phenomena Date: Chrysalis day#13 still no change from the Green color noted on 9/18/14 above. I am worried as this is at the long duration limit of 13 days for a Chrysalis and approximately at 2200 hrs I was brainstorming as to what I can do to save the Monarch. I remembered “Oh ----“ I had forgotten to spritz the Cocoon (I was taught to spritz lightly with water 1-2 times during the Chrysalis state but not after turning clear) I believe I had possible spritzed it once about Chrysalis day#5 and that was it; so it had been at least 1 week without a spritz if it had even had one at all. So I debated should I spritz it again this late in the game and decided I had nothing to loose. This is the phenomena or strange thing, “so I spritz the Chrysalis and instantly (I mean right then that very instant) the Chrysalis started to turn dark right before my eyes on the outer side. It was as if the spritz of water had activated something in the Chrysalis. The other side of the Chrysalis didn’t change with a lighter spritz of water so as to not overwater.
9/21/14: In the early AM the Chrysalis the one side that had started to change on 9/20/14 had turned even more black with no real change on the other side that was still Green. So in violation of rules I spritzed the Green side again and no instant change as on the other side. A few hours later the Green side was now changing and the Chrysalis was totally on it’s way to the final Black stage. By early evening it had turned stone cold Black. My limited experience is once it gets to this stage of Blackness it hatches within about an hour, but it didn’t.
9/22/14: In the AM the Chrysalis had not changed a bit from the pure dark black, (I could see through the clear outer edges of the Chrysalis) I was fearing OE or Black Death.
At 1600 hrs almost 24 hours in the dark black state Monarch#6 eclosed after 15 days in the Chrysalis. Monarch was slow to be ready for flight and hung onto the Chrysalis for 6-8 hours after eclosing. Monarch#6 was found later in the evening resting on the bottom of the cage for the night. I was still concerned about it’s health as I hadn’t been able to really examine her due to her inactivity.
9/23/14: After putting out in the Sun in the cage Monarch#6 became very active. I did a full visual physical and found a perfect Monarch with no signs of any deficiencies. At approximately 1100hrs after being cleared for flight Monarch#6 “The Miracle Monarch” was released.

Moline, IL

Latitude: 41.5 Longitude: -90.5

Observed by: Gene
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