Wow, I found lots of eggs today!

[dzyg]

I am in central WI and since I noticed my first Monarch butterfly of this year today I thought I would check my milkweeds and I found so many many eggs! Last year was the first year I actually looked for eggs vs the caterpillars but this is really early for around here. Most of the milkweeds are only about 6 inches tall or less right now. With so many eggs I hope they grow quickly as there are going to be lots of caterpillars soon. I took in seven of the eggs, the rest were on such little leaves that I didn't want to pull them off yet. These milkweeds are in my flowerbeds, the ones out in the fields don't seem to be even coming up yet. I think the Monarchs must have gone nuts as it probably hasn't found many more milkweeds. It seemed that every single plant out there had eggs on it. There are lots of plants, probably around 40 or so but they are so small yet. I am kind of worried that when they all hatch the plants won't be big enough to sustain them all. Any ideas??

Ok, I had to add, I do know that Monarchs prefer the small plants to the large ones to lay the eggs on. There aren't any big ones yet so they have no choice. I looked at them again this morning, we got rain yesterday and they seemed to have grown overnight. LOL! There are still some very small ones with eggs but they will probably be ok. These are old existing plants not newly seeded ones so they come up with the huge stalks and little leaves at first. I just couldn't believe the number of eggs I found. I still think at this point there are more eggs than this sized milkweed will be able to provide for but as long as the milk weed grows quickly they should be ok. They probably have a few days yet before the eggs hatch too.

[MILW]

Where are you in Wisconsin? I'm in Madison, and a lot of the local plants are 18" + high already. I've seen 3 adults in the past couple of days, but so far no eggs yet!

cheers- Scott

[harpo787]

Down in S. Florida, the milkweeds I cut back about 2 months ago are OUT OF CONTROL! I'll have to snap a pic next time I'm at mom's...but they are just huge. Unfortunately, out of about 12 cuttings, only two seem to have taken strongly...but one is tropical milkweed and the other is giant milkweeds, which are great.

I saw plenty of eggs on the milkweeds, but quite a few seemed to be dark grey, perhaps black. Are they just about ready to hatch, or are they dead already?

[MILW]

hopefully, almost ready to hatch. Their head turns black right before they hatch- see?

[dzyg]

I am near Marshfield WI, pretty much the center of the state. In the fields and such you cannot see any milkweeds yet but in my flowerbeds they are growing quickly. We had rain and sun on and off the last two days and now I swear if you sat and watched the milkweeds you could see them grow. LOL! Some are now probably about 10" high. It is amazing the difference a couple hours from Madison to Marshfield make in the growing season and the weather.

I have collected 22 eggs so far. I may have missed a few as I collected the rest last night and they milkweeds had closed up for the night. Never knew they did that but apparently when they are small yet they do. The eggs on the tiny leaves I have put in ziplock bags on a wet paper towel. I will check for more in a few days. I am thinking that I don't normally see many caterpillars this early cause maybe the ants usually get the eggs. This year I am interferring with that!

I am convinced that all these 22 eggs are from that one butterfly that I saw too! I don't even recall seeing Monarchs in May ever before, normally more like the middle of June before they make their way back here. It has been a warm Spring so far though.

Btw, great shot of that newly hatched caterpillar by the penny!

Donna

[MILW]

I'm going to take a walk around the Research Park this afternoon- there are several acres of prairie restoration and field grass with patches of milkweed here and there. I'll see if I can spot any eggs on the plants- I know at home, I have to collect them or else they disappear.

We're building a butterfly garden/Monarch waystation behind my company's building, but so far we've only got one milkweed plant in it!

cheers- Scott

[dzyg]

Good luck on your search today! How cool that you are adding a Monarch waystation to your work place. Hope it goes well for you. I took a walk up our road and found a few more small (8-10") milkweeds in the ditch on the edge of our property. I found and brought home 15 more eggs! There are ants really bad there so I want to go through them again more thoroughly, I had children with me at the time. I saw a Monarch too, not sure if it is the same one I saw the other day or not though.

Donna

[dzyg]

Can you beleive I now have 66 eggs in the house??? I looked again on my milkweeds in my flowerbeds and there are at least 11 more out there. Last year I only released a total of 74 butterflies, looks like I will top that this year.

[MILW]

You're going to have a busy couple of weeks! I found a couple of good patches of milkweed near work, and found two eggs only. A bunch more of milkweed at my house are coming up too.

Today I saw a monarch chasing some falling maple seeds! It was like a seed storm with some gusty weather, and the monarch was darting from one helicopter to another. It flew off to the north, like most of the others I've seen in the past week.

cheers- Scott