Date: 10/08/2025

Number: 60

On Wed Oct 8 I was watching/counting monarchs migrate overhead in the field on e side of woods behind our next door neighbor's house and noticed at about 5:45 that monarchs were flying to the woods instead of south, from all directions and at an increasing rate.

By sundown I'd observed at least 60 monarchs come in for a landing in the black willow on the west side of the woods behind our other next door neighbor's house. Relatively few went to adjacent trees. There were also monarchs flying in while I was trying to zoom in on clusters of monarchs.

The interior of the woods was empty, as it was yesterday. Compare to the first wave of migration when there were dozens in the interior of the woods. Of course back then it was downright hot, temps in the 90's weekend before last.

Something I don't get is, why was the black willow virtually empty the night before? There were plenty migrating when the cool front came through on Tuesday.

The migrating monarchs seem like they're unusually stressed. Notably more with faded & tattered wings compared to past years. Also, in past years monarchs have swirled around under the tree before settling in, but these guys just seemed to want to go straight to bed.

Mostly cloudy
76F
Wind: calm
Barometer: 30.20 in

Oklahoma City, OK

Latitude: 35.5 Longitude: -97.6

Observed by: Barbara
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