Date: 08/16/2018

Number: 75

I stopped counting at 75 but there were hundreds in the dunes at Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore. I was surprised to see so much Milkweed in the dunes.

It was pretty impressive to see all of them in a habitat that I did not expect so many to be there. We arrived at about 10 am and started seeing them almost immediately. We hiked over the dunes for about 2 hours and saw them for the entire time until we left about noon. The overnight temp had been mild, a low of about 72-75 and a bit muggy. Wind was not an issue only being about 5-7 mph. Temp got up to about 88-90. There are a lot of high dunes and drops, so they would have been sheltered during a higher wind.

As it was very sandy I was surprised to see so much Milkweed. It was in small patches and widely distributed.

It is very difficult to estimate numbers, but they were constantly flying around and we only covered a minuscule part of the dune area.

Glen Arbor, MI

Latitude: 44.9 Longitude: -86.1

Observed by: Ken
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