Beta Tester Roll Call

[Jim]

If you have been chosen as one of the 50 beta testers for this project and submitted payment for the prototype kit please "sound off" here by posting a reply to this topic so that we can make sure everyone has successfully registered here at the forums.

Please feel free to share a little about yourself as an introduction or just say a quick Hello, Hola, Bonjour, Guten Tag, Aloha, Ciao, Hej, Nazdar, Jambo, Konichiwa, or Kia Ora.

Thanks!

[sbowman]

I sent my payment in by paypal, the week that I received the email about being selected.
Sherry Bowman
Alvin, Texas
About myself:
After working 22 years in a chemical plant, I'm once again a (part-time) college student, attending University of Houston majoring in geography, minoring in ecology or geology - or something related. My plan right now is to teach earth science in (maybe) jr. high school. I have 2 children (7 yr daughter, 4 yr son) who I've enjoyed being at home with the last several years, and I'm married to a man who is very supportive of my school & butterfly hobbies (as well as other interests that I have).

Although I've always enjoyed nature, my focus in butterflies came by chance when we found a giant swallowtail dead in the yard. My daughter & I wanted to know more - and so it all began. We have branched out to provide host plants/nectar for gulf frittaries, black swallowtails, queens, monarchs (of course), giant swallowtails, snout butterflies and even a few moths (giant leopard, tersa sphinx, even found a black witch moth in our yard last year, and we've been trying to locate the polyphemus moths that like our maple tree). We also observe/study about earthworms, toads/frogs, pillbugs, and anything else that we can find outside.

Our kitchen and dining room sometimes appear to be a mess of science projects most of the time. But we love watching nature and learning more about it. (My father is a self-taught naturalist - you can't lose him in the woods - but he gets turned around in our own town, and he is wonderful to be with in the woods.)

[MILW]

I also paid by PayPal as soon as the notice came out. We've been raising Monarchs for at least 8 years now, since my first son was about 3. I'm a molecular virologist by training but did graduate and postgraduate work with Drosophila and Manduca sexta.

In addition to Monarchs, we currently have a Polyphemus pupa (I was finding giant frass under our birch tree, so I started to shake it by throwing a stick attached to a rope up into the branches, right over where the frass was landing. I got lucky and "plop" down he came, a fat caterpillar who ate for 3 days and then pupated in a branch hanging in our screen porch). Also just hatched today are 4 black swallowtails that I collected as eggs from my dill.

I also instigated a butterfly garden/Monarch Waystation at the place where I work, this is its first year but we have a ton of milkweed that grew from seeds I scattered last fall.

cheers- Scott

p.s we also have science projects all over the house and on the porch. We also keep cats, fish, hermit crabs, crickets, grapevine beetles, and mealworms in addition to the Leps!

[SWAMPMILKWEED]

Hi,

Waiting for the new gadgets and gizmos to arrive! Something new to tinker with...cool.

Yup, we do similar stuff. Raise monarchs and chase all species in the wild. I had 3 big finds this spring/summer: Frosted Elfins, Edwards Hairstreak and the Federally endangered, Karner blue. The Karner was in a protected area by The Nature Conservancy and has been successfully restored from extirpation in NW Ohio. It was a wild one and not a released one by the Toledo Zoo conservation dept. My counts go into the data base with the Ohio Leps for Ohio monitoring records. And I monitor plants in a OSU Ext office phenology bed for growing degree day data for a program at Ohio St Univ. This data on monarch temperatures/degree days is essentially a combination of my 2 current activities.

Looking forward to this new adventure. I know it will be sometime to see results, but it will be well worth the wait. Thank you.

[Pat]

Another quick-turnaround Paypal person here. Eagerly awaiting the gizmos. Hi Toledo, we're originally New Yorkers and SUNY grads, but we got our extra degrees at OSU a few decades back (husband PhD in O-chem, myself MS in math; he's a research chemist, I do computer consulting these days). We haven't been back to Columbus since heading back to our native East Coast for employment, though.

3 grown kids (1 just graduated college -- valedictorian of her class --, 1 a junior in college, 1 a HS senior); we've been raising monarchs and other critters here since they were little tykes. When not working on websites and databases, I enjoy working on living specimen photos for moth species - part of the N.A. Moth Photographers group. I'm a relative newcomer there, but a few of my photos are on display for species identifications on the Mississippi State entomological ID website. And I play a pretty mean piano on occasion but I'm not sure that's anything significant as far as educational or lepidoptery credentials go. Now I'm looking forward to retiring so I can spend more time on the bug hobbies and less time having to earn enough $$ to help pay the kids' humongous tuition bills.

[troot]

Hello, everyone! I sent in my payment and am eagerly awaiting the equipment. I'm a teacher (currently looking for a job) and got interested in using monarchs when I took a great class from Karen Oberhauser on using monarchs to teach observation skills, the scientific method, and so much more. I've been raising monarchs all summer and am on my third generation. I garden, too, so I have lots of milkweed and nectaring plants for butterflies (and flies, wasps, and other critters.) I also bird watch and participate in Cornell's Project FeederWatch during the winter. I enjoy observing nature and using my observations to help further our understanding of the world around us.
Teresa

[Pat]

Has anyone received their gizmos yet?

[Jim]

Has anyone received their gizmos yet?

Gizmos will be on their way this week to those (37) that have already submitted payment - sorry for the delay!

[SWAMPMILKWEED]

There are other lepidopterists interested in this program. Hoping to be able to apply it to their research species, ie Karner blue butterfly. Let's give it our best!

[Joyann856]

Hello

Excited to learn more about the temperature monitoring project, and help with beta testing.

I became interested in Monarch Butterflies quite accidentally while mowing my lawn a few years back. While mowing next to our field of goldenrod there were so many nectaring Monarchs (didn't know what kind they were back then!) I had to stop mowing, run to my computer and look up anything I could find about them. That is how I found Monarch Watch and became completely hooked on learning everything I could about this winged wonder.
I am not a scientist or teacher, but a 50 year old student of Monarch Studies via Monarch Watch! How quickly this amazing migration has become my favorite time of year.

[Madilily]

Finally got around to sending in my payment to be one of the chosen. I am an aquatic biologist for the state of Kansas and test water quality as well as work on special projects as needed. That is my daytime job but my free time is also spent around water and gardening and nature. My partner and I have an 11,000 gallon water garden in our front yard with an array of critters that visit it daily. We also have extensive butterfly gardens and shade gardens to attach wildlife, both 2 legged and 4 legged kind. On a daily basis, at least one person stops to peek into our paradise and admire the beauty of our gardens. I also dabble in photography but am still learning a lot. I have a lot of photo opportunities around our gardens to practice on. Mark, my partner in life, designed and built our Koi pond on his own and together we built the bridge that crosses the water to get into our front door. Madilily Gardens was a name I came up with to show our love of the gardens (especially lilies) Ma = Mark, Di = Diana, and lily thus - Madilily Gardens. We have had monarchs flying around the gardens in pairs for several weeks now. We have also seen black swallowtails and tiger swallowtails, questions marks, and the white cabbage butterflies. We have others that I haven't identified yet. We are very excited about being chosen to help in the beta testing. I hope it provides a lot of useful information not only to the monarch watch researchers but to us as well.

[MILW]

jealous! How many feet across/deep is 11,000 gallons? Do you have a photo gallery somewhere?

cheers- Scott

[Madilily]

The Koi pond is the biggest and it is 5.5 feet deep. The goldfish pond is about 40 inches deep. There is a waterfall inbetween those two ponds and the fish cannot intermingle: the bridge I mentioned goes over that waterfall. We keep the entire system clear with a natural filteration system we would promote to everyone which is a bog. The bog we constructed is about 18 inches deep and completely filled with gravel and plants. The plants uptake the ammonia and nitrogen the fish produce, thus keeping the water perfectly clear because algae have nothing to feed on. The water is pumped from the bog back up to a waterfall cascading down into the goldfish pond and going through the whole cycle again. Overall, I would say the entire system is about 65 feet long by 20 feet wide. Some of our water plants are tropical and we bring them in in the water but we have many hardy varieties that overwinter in the pond, including all the fish, even our big koi. We have 14 koi and numerous goldfish. Our biggest Koi is probably 34 inches long - maybe more. We discovered last winter that some of our tropicals were able to return after spending the winter in the pond. With being on the beta test, we are hoping to discover if we have established a mini-microclimate warm enough to plant Zone 6 (and maybe 7) plants without having the winter kill them out. Time will tell. I don't have a website with my pictures on it but that is a wonderful idea. I will work on that. Thanks for the suggestion.

[Ms. Joy N. Africano]

Hello All!

We are a brand new charter school in the city of Buffalo. We are beginning our second year this week.

I am the 7th grade science teacher. Our school year begins with raising 40 caterpillars from Monarchwatch, weighing the amount of milkweed they eat with a triple-beam balance and measuring their growth in centimeters. The students entered their data into an Excel program and graphed their data on computers.

Many of our students are from the inner city and have never had a pet before. They are very careful with their caterpillars and become quite fond of them. They handle the caterpillars with paint brushes and never physically touch them.

We tag the butterflies and release them.

In the spring, the students work in cooperative learning groups of 4 and are assigned a particular topic about the Monarch. Some of the topics are:

* Compare the migration of the Western Monarch to the Eastern Monarch
* The Monarch Life Cycle
* How humans are impacting the Monarch
*What can Oracle students do to help the Monarch? (includes designing a butterfly garden which we planted in front of our school)
* Survival of the Monarch (mimcry, defense mechanisms, predators, etc.)

Each group wrote a research paper (including a bibliography), made and presented a Powerpoint and completed an 'arts' component (drawings, maps, garden design, etc.)

I was able to take 58 students to the Niagara Falls, Canada, Butterfly Conservatory in June where they discovered frogs in ponds in the surrounding gardens and were awed by the flying butterflies in the conservatory. Many have never left their neighborhoods before so this was a real treat. We made a stop at Niagara Falls to add to the excitement of the day.

Our gardens were just recognized by the city of Buffalo in a "Buffalo in Bloom" program!

This project has taken 'flight' and just keeps growing and growing (all pun intended!

We are looking forward to the Temperature Monitoring project. One of the foci of our school is integration of technology. My students will be actively participating in the collecting of the data for this project.

That's all for now!

Joy Africano

[Teresa]

I'm going to be interested in watching this. I was hoping to be selected but I understand there can only be so many I'm just curious as to what criteria was used in selecting the beta sites.

[wbl56]

Here I am! Sorry it took so long to post here. I was having trouble logging into the forum, but things are working this morning.

I am pleased to be a part of this research. I have been raising monarchs for several years now, and it has been interesting to note the changes in population in my area over the years. After a decline for a number of years, this year has been wonderful. We have spotted more monarchs working the milkweed, and collected more eggs and larvae than we have for quite some time.

I made it my goal this past year to grow, somewhere on my property, all 12 species of milkweed native to Michigan. I got pretty close to meeting that goal this year. I currently have 11 of the 12 species growing somewhere on my property; some are in raised garden beds while others are naturalized in different locations around our house. I had all 12 species earlier this spring, but someone (deer, pehaps) likes young poke milkweed. I will be starting more seeds in the spring and will try to either protect the transplants better or find another location to try.

I am looking forward to working with the Monarch Watch staff and all of the volunteers on this project and am excited about future prospects.

Thanks for inviting me,

[Jack G]

Hi! Yes I have recently completed the Paypal. I am patiently awaiting my Gizmo also. I am a Teacher with a special services school district. This year I will be teaching Science to Multiple disabled high school students. We have a Butterfly garden that is less than 2 years old near my classroom and this is the second summer with about 25 cats each year. It appears that I am the only test site in New Jersey.

[Jim]

I'm just curious as to what criteria was used in selecting the beta sites.

The beta testers were chosen from those applicants that responded to my request for additional details. I narrowed things down a bit when I chose only those that were interested in a full kit. Then I tried to make sure that we had a good representation of U.S. states and Canadian provinces. From the resulting pool of applicants I made choices based on computer set up so that we could cover the widest range of hardware and software for the testing period. Then I closed my eyes and made some of the final choices at random

[cehoover]

I have received my beta kit. But need the software to up load to my computer. I will be placing the sensor in my wystatio garden tomorrow Aug 23 2006.

[ccullar]

Carol Cullar here for the Rio Bravo Nature Center Foundation, Eagle Pass, TX.

Our kit just arrived. Now what?

Eagerly awaiting instructions,

Carol

[Jim]

Our kit just arrived. Now what?

Have you checked out the "I've received the kit - now what?" topic?

I'll post more info there tonight...

[fontanapark]

My kit was waiting for me on my desk this morning. Ready for the next step.

[Naturestation]

We got our kit today and are very excitied. I work at Woodlands Nature Station at Land Between The Lakes, in KY & TN. We do a lot of butterfly programs as well as tag monarchs in the fall. Looking forward to all the cool info.

Kelly Wehrheim
Woodlands Nature Station
Land Between The Lakes

[MILW]

UPS pulled up yesterday evening! Ready to go here.
-Scott

[Jim]

Instructions for Mac users have been posted and those for Windows users will be onlne shortly, possibly tonight.

[chomenor]

Hello, We received our kit yesterday and look forward to participating in the testing program. Our monarch waystation (No.562) is 10 acres of native grassland and woodlands with an abundant supply of green milkweed (Asclepias viridis) and nectar plants. We have been watching the breeding and migrating monarchs for 6 years and have raised many in our home as well. My homeschooled sons are 11 and 16 and are full participants in our monarch observations and photography. We are learning so much and are hoping to become more active in monarch research and conservation.

Each spring we watch the old, faded (heroic) monarchs arrive to lay their eggs and the development of the first generation of young, bright monarchs who will fly north. This year was a bumper crop and the milkweeds were equally abundant. Our summer here was relatively cool with plenty of rain, so we again have an abundant crop of milkweeds and nectar plants. Interestingly, we have been seeing 5+ faded monarchs laying eggs each day in the past week in late morning, coming from the north and heading south.

This August there also seems to be an abundance of other types of butterflies -- our fields seems to be full of moving color! Bees and hummingbirds as well. Our habitat is home to deer, raccoons, hawks, rabbits, squirrels, anoles, snakes (of course), all types of birds, armadillos, etc. We feel very blessed to have a monarch habitat and are so grateful to Monarch Watch for their support, education, encouragement, and chance to participate in research.

Many thanks,
Bill & Kathy with sons Noah & Mark

[terbo21793]

Hello everyone. Teresa and Jim Gallion here... Ready to get instructions on how to down load what and where etc.

This should be interesting.... !

[Judy Molnar]

Howdy, all!
We just received our kit yesterday while I was at a local environmental educators conference.

I'm a full time educator at the Virginia Living Museum in Newport News VA, this is my 20th year here. I have a B.S. in Animal Science, M.S. in Zoology, another M.S. without thesis in Biology. I fell into teaching by accident by doing science demonstrations at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago to feed myself as a grad student. Once I got a job teaching for a year at the Bronx Zoo in NYC, I was hooked.

I've been tagging monarchs for the museum & myself since 1996. I began a personal butterfly garden in 1991 and certified both my home garden and the museum's gardens as Monarch Waystations last year.

Working here means teaching many different natural sciences to K through adult and being part of many different projects and exhibits over the years. The education staff rotate through all the programs, I've done most but not all of them. Check out the new website "www.thevlm.org" once it is up and running. [We are just upgrading it as I write this].

We exhibit the monarch caterpillars when we can during September, and I do the tagging demonstrations on the days we have monarchs to release. One of our volunteers, Tede Johnson, is inspiration since she was tagging when Fred Urquhart was sending out the tags that had to be glued on! She's in her 70's, an awesome butterfly sister and we never tire of watching the Monarch life cycle. I've always enjoyed the feeling that we're contributing to science by doing this, maybe because I couldn't finish my PhD.

The VLM is honored that it is the only Beta Testing site in Virginia!
Education and Horticulture staff will now decide where to put the logger [we have several milkweed patches to choose from] while I get the logger ready on Monday. We are having E mail issues because of our web site update and I thank Jim for helping me log back in to the forum to get messages & instructions!

Looking forward to learning a whole new thing!
Judy Molnar

[Don Spearance]

Thanks for including me and my students in this exciting adventure. I have been teaching first grade in Massachusetts for over 30 years and always begin the year raising, tagging and releasing monarchs with my students. I am doubly excited as I will be chaperoning a school trip of fifth and sixth graders to Mexico City in February, and will be taking a trip up to Michoacan to visit the winter home of these wonderful creatures.[size=9]

[connifer]

I have my kit, but no instructions. When will the Windows downloads be ready?

Connie Bachman
Frederick MD

[Jim]

When will the Windows downloads be ready?

I'll have instructions online this weekend.

[whiteelise]

I live in Overland Park, Kansas (Kansas City) with my husband Curt, a seventh grade science teacher, and my sons Russell and Charley, ages 10 and 13. I graduated from the University of Kansas with a BS in civil engineering.

I have known Chip Taylor and his family since I was a little girl and that is how I have become interested in monarchs and monarchwatch.org. I know very little about monarchs except that they are beautiful and make me happy.

This year, I have an absolute abundance of tropical milkweed. I saved seeds and planted them and seem to have volunteers from seeds that made it through a warm winter growing from every nook and cranny.

I will look forward to learning a lot more about monarchs!

[mbarton]

We are excited about participating in the Temperature Monitoring Program. My wife is a Special Ed. teacher in an elementary school. I am a 6th grade Earth Science teacher in a middle school. We have raised and observed Monarchs for about 12 years. My classes also participated in the Hydrogen Isotope project. Over the years sixof our tagged Monarchs have been sighted in Mexico. Monarchs are a doorway to getting kids interested in science. Mark Barton

[Sandwhy]

Well I just got back from vacation and awaiting me upon my return was the kit! VERY excited. Already peeked at the MAC directions but I'm sure I'll be posting questions in no time.

A little about me: I am a hand model (yes that's right, I wrote hand model, and yes I've seen that episode of Seinfeld!) and also a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia (French horn). I worked as a hand model in NYC for 10 years before moving to the Chicago area to do the same. I still play my horn with the Sarasota Opera Company in Florida every winter.

I love to go birding during spring and fall migration (not to mention the avifauna down in Florida during the winter months). NYC Central Park was the BEST. After moving to Illinois in 2004 I discovered gardening (yes I wear gloves... three pair, actually!) and also butterflies, both of which seem to like our teeny property here on the North Shore. We've had 61 species of birds and at least 14 different butterflies visit our yard since 2004. The gardening and raising Monarchs has fit into my birding and opera schedule quite nicely thus far!

I am also participating in OE research (U-Georgia) and hopefully the Monarch Larval Monitoring Project. This daughter-of-a-veterinarian and sister-of-a-plant biologist is finally finding her scientific brain. Sort-of.

Thanks for having me!

Sandy

[Tom Clark]

Privjet! Tom in Tulsa here. (Privjet is Russian) We're back in school now, and ready to get the students involved with the research. Danke!

[mschwegler]

i've received my kit and am trying to get oriented and follow the instructions. this is my first online forum, hope i'm doing it right. will let you know when/if i get the hookup working! Marti, Overland Park, KS

[mschwegler]

Marti here- I am all installed thanks to my husband! I, too, am confused about what to do now. Just wait for further instructions / Jim's posting, or have I missed out on that part?? Are we supposed to be gathering info like these folks who talk about graphs etc?

Also, should the logger be mounted in the shade of plants, full sun? I thought I read something about full sun, but there are so many pages of messages I don't know where to look now. Maybe it was is Jim's discussion of early testing at Lawrence.

Someone tell me where to put this logger (nicely, please).

Marti

[mschwegler]

Why do my messages and profile say I joined the forum on Aug 7th when I joined today, Sept 7? Do I need to set a calendar somewhere? My computer is correct. Marti

[gkalbaugh]

Hello from the beautiful Potomac Highlands of West Virginia,

I received my monitoring device in late August and was surprised not to have found instructions for installing the unit outdoors and for the proper set up to relay data via the internet.

My middle school science classes have been tagging Monarchs for about ten years and thoroughly enjoy being involved in this interesting research and are looking forward to this new aspect of the project.

[MILW]

The instructions are in the post by Jim "Instructions for Mac Users" and "Instructions for Windows Users", e.g.

That's it for now! Disconnect the probe and install the logger on the north side of a post or other structure within your monarch habitat at a height of .5 meters (about 20 inches) with the metal logger facing the ground. Allow the logger to collect data for several days and keep checking back here for further details.

Here's a link to the instructions for Windows:http://www.monarchwatch.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=712

I'll admit the instructions are sketchy, but really, it is only one screw! On the north side of the post so the logger won't be in the full sun, at least not for the full day...

I'm sure Jim will post the instructions for retrieving the data when he gets a chance- I'd guess not this weekend what with the Open House going on!

cheers- Scott

[pyburtt]

We got our kit and hooked it up to computer and put the probe up near the garden.

[jbardwell]

REceived the data equipment and will set up so as to begin testing equipment. Thanks and looking forward to seeing how this all works out.
Jenny Bardwell

[tcannard]

I have downloaded the software, installed it and am anxiously awaiting delivery of the Thermochron unit. It should be very interesting to see how closely the readings match some of the other temperature probes I have! Delighted to be a part of the project and looking forward to collecting some data.
This year I had a small plot of maybe 30 common milkweed on which over the course of several weeks, I counted maybe 2 dozen first instar larva. Unfortunately, none which I left in the garden seemed to live past the first instar. I did bring three inside and they completed their cycle, were tagged (with some left-over tags from a previous year) and released.

[Melusine13]

Rec'd Beta Test kit, set it up. The little Monarch decal has worn away with weather (which I think had the device #?). Am trying to download data without much success. Will check other postings. Started Butterfly Garden at the elementary school, where I docented for 7 years. I have many monarchs and also am testing a theory that mosquito dunks in water where potted milkweed reside, make the plants toxic over time. My son did a science fair project on it and it seemed to show a 50% mortality in juveniles after about 6 weeks in the dunk-tea. Also testing to see if seeds are then toxic. Had fortuitous milkweed come up next to pool pump. Lots of chlorine tab residue surrounding. All other milkweed in garden was eaten by larvae, except these plants that had gotten a lot of chlorine mixed with rainwater. Testing to see if these seeds are toxic then too. If I made cuttings from either test plants, caterpillars grew sick and died. Maybe fortuitous-if caterpillars had been stung by a tachonid wasp, but all caterpillars seemed to hemorrage green goo, then color fade then death. Also, lots of wasps and large ants that harvest the caterpillars from my milkweed in Texas. So set up a terrarium with milkweed cuttings in jars, where I transplant wild caterpillars and protect them until they morph. I have sticks that go up to the window-screen lid. Have soil on the bottom. Most caterpillars crawl up to the mesh and make their chrysalis. -Melusine 13

[Charles Yelton]

Hi Everyone,

Sorry about the late posting! I'm with the NC Museum of Natural Sciences. We use Monarch Watch and MLMP with teacher workshops as well as part of our citizen science programs for students. We have just established a new field station that will be home to a wide variety of field research that will involve students of all ages. Our aim is to teach science as a process, not just a collection of facts in books.

Some of the research projects are nationaly facilitated ones such as Monarch Watch, while others are facilitated by Museum and local University scientists. My job is to coordinate the whole thing while infusing new technologies into the methods and procedures of the research. I'm really excited about Monarch Watch's use of iButton dataloggers and look forward to using them.

We have received our equipment, installed it and the associated hardware, and have been happy with the results thus far. I would be interested to know if there are any better user interfaces for windows or for handhelds. I would love to have our students collect the data, but I want the technology to be as transparent as possible.

[jbardwell]

We're out here in southwestern PA and anxious to see how the data monitoring works, once I get it installed correctly. We've got lots of Monarchs and last year they arrived the earliest we have ever seen them, in May.
Jenny Bardwell