Date: 07/11/2021
Number: 1
I don’t know if this counts as déjà vu, but it was certainly a striking incident. Yesterday I reported glimpsing a Monarch butterfly that was flitting over a fallow field while I was driving home from work.
Today the same thing happened at the exact same place, albeit 20 minutes earlier than yesterday. I saw a Monarch butterfly darting back and forth over the field, eventually heading up the hillside and out of sight. This all took place in no more than 20 seconds, so again no photo or determination of gender.
Given that there are numerous common milkweeds growing in the field, along with other flowering plants (e.g., pink clover and Queen Anne’s Lace), and the butterfly never landed on any of them, I’m guessing that this was a male searching for a mate rather than a female looking to lay eggs. (Granted, I certainly don’t know how Monarch butterflies think about these matters; e.g., it could have been a female who was looking for taller plants on which she could lay some eggs.)
At this point, I will consider it to have been a nice coincidence. But I am curious to see what occurs on my drive home tomorrow afternoon. If the same thing happens 3 days in a row, what would be the odds that it’s same butterfly making its daily afternoon rounds over this field? This all took place at about 2:45 PM. At the time we had overcast skies with a 9 mph wind from the South. Other weather conditions were:
- Tim
College Twp, PA
Latitude: 40.8 Longitude: -77.8
Observed by: R. Timothy
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