Monarchs between MI & OH

[Monarch MaMa]

Hello Friends! I just returned from a short trip between SE MI to Niagara Falls thru Ontario, then down thru Ontario to Windsor & back home. The sad sad news: very little milkweed was found except in the meridian of the highways. Its been my experience that monarchs avoid heavy fast traffic for depositing their eggs so these milkweeds are only good for pulling & feeding broods already gathered at home. I saw very very few milkweed growing in areas without interstate traffic. All of the farmfields were devoid of milkweed, and I saw thousands of acres over the last 3 days. I was in Chatham Ontario this morning and one friend mentioned that they saw just today their first monarch. Of course, I told him about monarchwatch & he thought it would be a good endeavor to start with his grandchildren. Though I saw no monarch butterflies, near Lake Erie I found one 3rd instar, three 1 instars and about 20 eggs. Yep, I gathered them all up and smuggled them across the border back to the 'States where I'll happily add them to my 120 cats & tag 'em. While at the Butterfly Conservatory in Niagara Falls, I saw only one wild tiger swallowtail on butterfly bush. They had a few monarch chrysalis' in the observation window and I believe I saw a Queen, but all the other butterflies were foreigners. Their presentation also did not mention the reduced populations, but they did have gentle suggestions for helping by not spraying pesticides, planting native vegetation, etc. Since I'm finding eggs today (Aug 22) and it takes 4 weeks for them to mature, I'm hoping we'll have a later frost. ...flutters away