Date: 09/27/2014
Number: 16
Saw three Monarchs on my drive to New Richmond and back, all of them flying at about 6'---going south, or west. Winds from the southeast, 5-10 mph.......
After reading the wonderful report in Monarch Joint Venture ----(Fall Migration - How do they do it?
Posted: Thursday, September 25, 2014 10:51am by Wendy Caldwell in Migration by Candy Sarikonda)----- I was lucky enough to see a Monarch illustrate its use of thermals.
Just as Candy described, when the Monarch got to the southwest corner of the lake, it used the thermals there to circle up over the treetops, and then glided southwest, tacking into the wind so to speak.
I just looked up sailing into the wind and found this:
This diagram shows how tacking works, allowing a sailor to move into the wind by zigzagging along.
“A sailor can sail to a point that lies directly into the wind, he just can’t steer straight for it," said Isler. “He must approach it in a zigzag manner, called tacking.”
In steering toward the point that he wants to reach, he comes at it at about a 45 degree angle, then he tacks, or turns his boat about 90 degrees in the other direction, and after traveling in that direction for a ways, he tacks again back to his original angle.
ALSO: YESTERDAY SAW 13 MONARCHS IN THE CLOVER FIELD NEAR HERE. SUMMERWARM WEATHER (80 DEGREES) BUT SOUTHEAST WINDS EVERY DAY.
Osceola, WI
Latitude: 45.3 Longitude: -92.7
Observed by: Pat
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