Nothing in Maryland

[skates4marty]

I've about given up getting any eggs from the first wave. Looks like all the action is in the midwest.

[Mona Miller]

I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Have you checked out the sightings on Journey North? A friend that lives about 5 minutes away had seen one when I haven't seen any. Her sighting was on 5/10.

So far, no eggs or larvae have been reported. Looks like it will be June or July before I see Monarchs.

[skates4marty]

Mona, you've been doing this a lot longer than I. Was last year's huge first wave (for us, starting April 29 with the first egg) an aberration?

[Mona Miller]

Twenty years ago, they came in late April. Denise Gibbs has taught me that sometimes coastal storms push them inland and they miss us. For the past five years, it has been June or July. I used to order eggs from Florida to get started breeding, but stopped due to disease. Now, I wait until I see them naturally.

[David Calhoun]

Mona, in the previous post on this topic,skates4marty mentions a first wave. Does that mean that we can expect to see cats at two peaks, when the monarchs are migrating north, and then later when they are migrating south? Or do the monarchs lay eggs all season long? I found about 10 cats between
5/29/10 and 6/4/10, but now, nothing at all since.( I'm still new at this).David

[Mona Miller]

http://www.learner.org/jnorth/maps/Sightings_All.html
Pick Monarch egg, larvae or adult from the drop down list.

They are still being seen in the mid-atlantic region according to Journey North. I still haven't see any. Not many butterflies visiting my yard at all. The weather is crazy. Hot 90 degree days and then drops to 80s or lower.

[skates4marty]

Last year, I found the first egg April 28. That was a little earlier than usual: In 2008, the first was 5/7. In 2006, first egg 5/4. But I was not prepared for the numbers. I expect to have to use the whole dining room table during the Aug-Sept craziness, but not in May. I'd clear a small place on the table, put one cage out. Go to the garden, find more eggs and cats. Get another cage out. Forage for milkweed, bring home strays. By the end of May, 32 butterflies had eclosed.

Then, the lull. Just 2 butterflies in June and July.

The real wave started around Aug 8, as it always does. Our house (just an average suburban house with 2 patches of A. tuberosa) raised just over 100 more, with the last eclosing the first week of October.

[Wyvern]

Typically I do not see monarch eggs/pillars until July so I usually don't worry until then. MANY years ago there was one year when the initial wave of monarchs coming up were doing major egg dumping so there were tons of pillars in April at a time when there wasn't enough milkweed sprouted to support them.