Date: 10/22/2016

Number: 500

One of my coworker naturalists here at Calvert County Natural Resources was there at Point Lookout State Park in Scotland , Maryland on 3 different dates in October to attempt to tag monarchs, and this is the info that he shared with me:

On Sunday Oct 16 he saw and tagged only one. Then on Saturday, Oct 22 when there was a strong North Wind, he saw & tagged 11 butterflies over a 3 hour time period. On Sunday, Oct 23 in the same spot, there were easily 400-500 monarchs. In a 2 hour time period, he had used up all of his 100 tags, and a volunteer with 25 tags used an unknown number of tags. He said that for every one he tagged, there were 4-5 that he missed (thus the 400-500 monarch estimate). Initially, the monarchs were roosting high up in the pines but as the temperatures rose, they began flying out of the trees. According to my coworker, there was a pretty steady west wind (appx 15mph) and temperatures were in the upper 50s to mid 60s. It was a sunny day and the smoke from a nearby house fire didn’t seem to deter them. The butterflies were mainly flying, and a few were nectaring on thistle and asters.

At my house an hour north of Pt Lookout State Park on the 23rd, I was surprised to see 3 monarchs at 10:30am because it was very windy and still a chilly 55 degrees, but I didn’t see any more that day. Across the bay from my house at Ocean City, Maryland, I noticed that people were reporting sightings of 400-500 monarchs that weekend too.

Over the last 2 years since I’ve been keeping track of my monarch sightings, I have noticed that we have seen the most monarchs at parks, farms, and houses that border rivers and the Chesapeake Bay, and it seems like our peak migration is mid-October.

Some of my notes from last year that may interest you, someone who worked at Pt lookout State Park tagged over 200 monarchs the week of Oct 12-16, 2015. One of her tags was recovered this winter. Two coworkers each saw one monarch at 2 different locations along the Patuxent River in Maryland on Dec 15, 2015.

I will see if anyone in my coworker’s group got some pictures that they’d be willing to share from the 23rd at Pt. Lookout State Park so that you can post a picture.

Editor's note: We've re-dated this report from 10/23 to 10/22, the night the roost formed.

Scotland, MD

Latitude: 38.1 Longitude: -76.3

Observed by: Shannon
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