Date: 09/25/2020

Number: 3000

9am. Many more monarchs than previous report on Sept. 18! This second wave is much bigger than the first (report Sept. 18).

Nectaring on sunflowers, then flying to rest/roost in north side of hedgerow along south side of sunflower field. Monarchs cover the trees like leaves. Impossible to count. There were also several hundred in fields in the area and trying to find places to rest in trees out of the wind. 70 degrees, 20 mph south wind.

Checked on them at 9 am Saturday (9/26), so they would have been there the Friday night (9/25). They were resting there in the hedge trees (osage orange) because they were protected from the stiff south wind. The hedge row is a half mile long and there were monarchs all along the hedgerow roosting in the trees.

We didn't know how to do an accurate count, so 3000 is just a number to indicate there were countless monarchs. There are at least 300 in one tree. So if you multiply that by a half mile of trees with monarchs in lots of the trees... 3000 is likely an under-estimate.

They were also there Saturday night (9/26) before the cold front came through. The monarchs seemed to be staging there until the next cold front, numbers were building for several days during severe south winds. We observed them several times....Saturday morning and evening, and the monarchs were there all day.

Postnote: My brother went out and checked the hedgerow and sunflower field on Monday the 28th after the cold front had come through and there wasn't a single monarch left.

Walton, KS

Latitude: 38.2 Longitude: -97.3

Observed by: Linda
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