Milkweeds in the inland Northwest

[Billfish]

I started this thread to avoid hijacking the seed germination thread which I did not want to interfere with, so let's continue the discussion here... I agree Paul, that central Wa. had some pretty good numbers of monarchs and milkweeds back in the 70's. North idaho milkweed patches were always nearly unused. I would search extensively to find a couple of cats each summer to raise as a teen. I now teach a biology class at a small private school here, and hope to use monarchs as a sort of theme to teach a number of aspects of the class throughout the year. The recovery of a migrating population of monarchs to the inland northwest will be a fun and rewarding pursuit for me and my class for a number of years to come. There is a lot of country between here and northern California that we can do nothing about, but we can start here, and see where that takes us. I have some ideas that may help to inspire others allong that migration corridor to do the same.

[Mona Miller]

I hate to say this, but look at the Western Monarch population. Perhaps with the increased population this year, there just might be a chance that they'll make it up that far.

http://monarchnet.uga.edu/Resources/wes ... archs1.pdf
Western Monarchs at Risk
(Look at the graph on page 2.)

[Billfish]

Hello Mona, yes, I am accutely aware of the state of the western population. I don't follow where you were coming from. That is exactly my point. I don't beleive it is all due to the loss of winter habitat. It has been the result of a number of factors, but a very big part of the decline has been the result of the loss of summer breeding habitat range-wide which makes fewer fall migrants (None from a large part of historic range). Fewer overwintering adults, in turn, directly affects the number of adults dispersing the following spring, and the more distant a place is, the fewer monarch we will see the following year. We see far too few here to contribute anything right now, and have for decades. Are you saying you hate to tell me, but it is a waste of time to start working on habitat because they will never make it here? One was documented 80 miles away in 2010. I know they can. The whole migration corridor is in poor shape (broken). If we can improve that, and make it easier to move north, more of them will, and the northern half of western monarch range may once again add to numbers down south. It will take years, but It will never happen if we don't start somewhere. Don't shut me down before I start. Think positive.

[Mona Miller]

I'm afraid that you have misunderstood my comment. I would never tell anyone not to plant milkweed or create habitat. I posted the website so that you could see the numbers, so that you could see that other organizations are working to increase habitat and milkweed. I did want you to understand that the low numbers (overwintering count numbers in California) have probably been one of the causes of you not seeing them--along with the lack of milkweed, etc.





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[Billfish]

I have been reading this board and the Western Monarch board for a couple of years now, so I do know of their program. It is the hope of these kinds of large scale progress, combined with many small scale garden patches bridging the gaps in between that I am counting on eventually rebuilding the migration corridor. I currently am propagating our native showy and swamp milkweeds, and some common garden varieties as well, to distribute to anyone who wants them up here. Locals think that milkweed is "that prickly weed with the yellow flowers and fluffy seeds that has the white sap and stinks when they pull it out of their gardens". Why would anyone want to plant that? They also misidentify the swallowtails, fritillaries, and painted ladies as Monarchs. We have a lot of educating to do here.

[Mona Miller]

Are there any native plant, master gardener, master naturalist or butterfly groups that you can work with?

I give plants away and seeds all the time. I collected a bunch of common milkweed, which is similar to your showy and distributed seeds this fall at a local farm (really it is a farm that has all kinds of wonderful outdoor entertain for everyone (I can't say just kids).

Have you checked out the main Monarch Watch listserv? There are people from all over on that.
http://www.monarchwatch.org/dplex/index.htm
Dplex-L is the name of our electronic mailing list and discussion group on the Internet. If you have an internet Email account, you can join in!

I'd also highly recommend posting what you are doing on the Western listserv. That list just isn't about Pacific Grove.

There's also a NorWest Leps are you on that. The butterfly digest has lots of butterfly listservs:
http://www.butterflydigest.com/s/digest.pl?rm=all_lists

[Paul Cherubini]

I now teach a biology class at a small private school here

If you are a science teacher then you should reason in mathematical terms, not religious or faith based terms. The indisputable math realities are that no person or organization has been growing native western milkweeds in the types of habitats where they were abundant prior to the 1990's; e.g. along roadsides, railway lines, freeway cloverleafs, farm irrigation ditches, horse and cattle pastures, etc. And no person or organization has been able to stop the ongoing destruction of milkweed in such habitats. Thus without restoration and with nothing done to stop the ongoing destruction, the overall biomass of milkweed in the West will continue to decline, hence the size of the western monarch migratory population will continue to decline.

It makes no mathematical sense to think home gardeners could reverse the decline in milkweed biomass in the West. For example, in the college town of Lawrence, Kansas, population 88,000 and the headquarters of the Monarch Watch, there are only a handful of registered Monarch Waystations. Thus only an extremely small percentage of the public will ever likely be growing native milkweeds in their yards, even in the college towns.

The Xerces Society has not even been able to stop the destruction of wild speciosa milkweed in and around it's own home city of Portland, Oregon. I found and photographed many patches of speciosa there in 1997 along roadsides and railway lines and most had monarch caterpillars. Then when I went back there in 2010 these patches had disappeared - obviously sprayed in some cases.

[Billfish]

Religion and faith were never brought up. Biology teacher for 2 hrs a week. Fish Research for State Nat Resource Mgmt Agency for 40+ hrs Wk. I can talk in numbers, and know what is happening to their habitat. It's not just monarch habitat being lost to "progress". No expectations of private gardens ever replacing historic habitat. Instead, I see value in bridging the miles between existing larger patches to increase connectivity of the available habitat and give a boost to annual dispersal of egg-laying adults The actual number of southbound migrants in diapause produced from these gardens may be relatively minute, but if they help connect egg laying monarchs to unused milkweed that now exists in the tens of thousands of square miles in the inland northwest, they will have far greater value than the few hundred they produce. There are virtually no monarchs produced anywhere up here most years. All we have to do is get some egg-laying adults to reach Hermiston and points north, and they have habitat that is slowly increasing again. It's there now, unused, with sometimes 10 to 50 miles of land between substantial patches. Private gardens might provide the boost to a female to keep her searching for them, or a place to deposit some of her eggs if she has not found any patches. In two years, I've handed out / planted a couple hundred seedlings. Not one is listed as a monarch way station but they are there, none the less. I suspect there are more gardens with milkweeds not listed, elsewhere. We are on the same side. let's work together, or at least encourage one another. I don't have a PHD or MS, and you would like me if we spent any time together.

[Paul Cherubini]

All we have to do is get some egg-laying adults to reach Hermiston and points north, and they have habitat that is slowly increasing again. It's there now, unused, with sometimes 10 to 50 miles of land between substantial patches.

Well far fewer are reaching Hermiston, OR and points north in June nowadays because of the loss of spring milkweed biomass in California (the monarch adults that reach northern Oregon and Washington in June are nearly all offspring of the monarchs that overwintered along the Calif. coast). Even fewer can be expected to arrive in the future (except for this coming summer when there will definately be some) because the loss of milkweed biomass in California continues (although not as bad in recent years due to the housing slump).

I'm puzzled why you say habitat north of Hermiston, Oregon is slowly increasing. Urban development and the intensification of agricultural practices continues in Idaho and Washington just as it does in California. So the overall biomass of milkweed in the Northwest continues to decline just as it does in California.

I'm also puzzled by your "connectivity of milkweed patches" statements. Monarchs do well even if milkweed patches are very widely scattered. In the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, for example, it's routine to find monarchs breeding on remote, widely scattered patches of milkweed like these:

Location #2: 4 miles west of Sapinero, Colorado, elevation 8,151 feet:

Close up photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/coloj.jpg
Landscape photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/coloi.jpg
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Location #3: Gunnison, Colorado, elevation 7,703 feet:

Close up photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colol.jpg
Landscape photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colok.jpg
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Location #4: 1.8 miles east of Maysville, Colorado, elevation 8,205 feet:

Ultra close photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colop.jpg
Close up photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/coloo.jpg
Landscape photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colon.jpg
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Location #5: Near intersection of Christy Ave. & 8th Street in Saguache, Colorado, elevation: 7,695 feet

Ultra close photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/coloq.jpg
Semi-close up photo:
http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/color.jpg
Landscape photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colos.jpg
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Location #6 2 miles north of Alamosa, Colorado along Hwy 17, elevation: 7,539 feet: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colot.jpg
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Location #7 1 miles east of Monte Vista, Colorado along Hwy 160, elevation: 7,663 feet

Closeup photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colov.jpg
Landscape photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colou.jpg
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Location #8: Del Norte, Colorado along Hwy 160 elevation: 7,880 feet

Closeup photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colox.jpg
Landscape photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/colow.jpg
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Location #9: 1 mile east of South Fork, Colorado along Hwy 160, elevation: 8,180 feet:

Closeup photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/coloz.jpg
Landscape photo: http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/coloy.jpg

[Mona Miller]

Religion and faith were never brought up. Biology teacher for 2 hrs a week. Fish Research for State Nat Resource Mgmt Agency for 40+ hrs Wk. I can talk in numbers, and know what is happening to their habitat. It's not just monarch habitat being lost to "progress". No expectations of private gardens ever replacing historic habitat. Instead, I see value in bridging the miles between existing larger patches to increase connectivity of the available habitat and give a boost to annual dispersal of egg-laying adults The actual number of southbound migrants in diapause produced from these gardens may be relatively minute, but if they help connect egg laying monarchs to unused milkweed that now exists in the tens of thousands of square miles in the inland northwest, they will have far greater value than the few hundred they produce. There are virtually no monarchs produced anywhere up here most years. All we have to do is get some egg-laying adults to reach Hermiston and points north, and they have habitat that is slowly increasing again. It's there now, unused, with sometimes 10 to 50 miles of land between substantial patches. Private gardens might provide the boost to a female to keep her searching for them, or a place to deposit some of her eggs if she has not found any patches. In two years, I've handed out / planted a couple hundred seedlings. Not one is listed as a monarch way station but they are there, none the less. I suspect there are more gardens with milkweeds not listed, elsewhere. We are on the same side. let's work together, or at least encourage one another. I don't have a PHD or MS, and you would like me if we spent any time together.

There's a person in Oregon that feels the same way that you do:

http://www.randomscripts.com/milkweed/milkindex.htm
The Oregon Milkweed Project

http://www.randomscripts.com/milkweed/blog.html
He started his website in 2000. His blog says he saw a Monarch in Northern Oregon (Portland) in 2006.

[Paul Cherubini]

There's a person in Oregon that feels the same way that you do: http://www.randomscripts.com/milkweed/milkindex.htm
The Oregon Milkweed Project
http://www.randomscripts.com/milkweed/blog.html
He started his website in 2000. His blog says he saw a Monarch in Northern Oregon (Portland) in 2006.

Yes, and what has that project accomplished over the past 11 years? Has the project attempted and succeeded in establishing good sized milkweed patches like this facicularis patch along roadsides, railway lines, crop margins, horse and cattle pastures? Not to my knowledge. Same situation with the Xerces Society and Monarch Joint Venture...lots of talk about "restoration", but no photos or videos documenting successful plantings in the types of habitats where milkweed historically used to be abundant. Thus no mathematically significant progress is being made to reverse the decline in milkweed biomass as far as I can tell in the Pacific Northwest or California.

Here is the photo I intended to post http://i636.photobucket.com/albums/uu87 ... bitat5.jpg which is an example of the types of milkweed patches that need to be created.

Monarchs definately can use roadside milkweeds successfully as these videos of newly hatched monarchs and chrysalids show: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwz9TBX3RwY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu61vuj-E70
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1zS2jtcABI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YLgBYvUFSiM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0KESfAlghg

[Mona Miller]

http://www.randomscripts.com/milkweed/photos.html
The Oregon Milkweed Project has better pictures.

[Billfish]

Paul, I'v been wondering about fascicularis and it's application here. It is listed as making it to Kootenai county but I haven't seen any here. With the shorter plants and smaller leaves of fascicularis, is speciosa a better plant to focus on using exclusively, or is there a benefit to my using it too. How would the benefit per stem ratio compare for growing the two species. Is fascicularis more adaptable to arid locations that speciosa doesn't establish well in?

[Mona Miller]

There is a way to see where it has been naturally located in counties in Idaho:

http://plants.usda.gov/java/county?stat ... ymbol=ASFA
http://arcmapper.sc.egov.usda.gov/outpu ... 633296.jpg
Asclepias fascicularis

http://plants.usda.gov/java/county?stat ... ymbol=ASSP
http://arcmapper.sc.egov.usda.gov/outpu ... 633298.jpg
Asclepias speciosa

http://plants.usda.gov/java/stateSearch ... Field.y=11
Asclepias species in Idaho

Just click on the species, then click on the state.

[Billfish]

Thanks Mona, yes that is exactly how I knew it was reported from here. Those sights are helpful, and your references to them in the past for other posters is where I first learned of some of them. I was particularly wondering about which spp. would be most beneficial to use in restoration efforts, given the size differences of the two. Is one better to plant than the other? If fascicularis is more drought tollerant it may be useful where speciosa gets a little to dry in August, that sort of thing. Given that fascicularis is more toxic than speciosa, I think most landowners would be more receptive to speciosa , but in places where no livestock are present or adjacent, it might have application.

[Mona Miller]

We do not have either of these species in Virginia. I would suggest talking with the native plant people there in your area. I noted that the person in Oregon was planting both Asclepias fascicularis and Asclepias speciosa. I did email him, but haven't heard back.

A. speciosa does have more foliage.

[Paul Cherubini]

If fascicularis is more drought tollerant it may be useful where speciosa gets a little to dry in August, that sort of thing. Given that fascicularis is more toxic than speciosa, I think most landowners would be more receptive to speciosa , but in places where no livestock are present or adjacent, it might have application.

Fascicularis is definately more drought tolerant than speciosa and surprisingly, more tolerant of waterlogged soils as well. I tried planting it (from seed) at several roadside spots early last summer and it will be interesting to see if these seedlings produced rhizomes that survived the winter and send up new shoots this coming Spring.

Speciosa seems to do better than fascicularis in the deeply maritime climate of northwestern Oregon and western Washington, however.

[Mona Miller]

http://altizerlab.uga.edu/Publications/ ... er2005.pdf
Page 11 end of page, Page 12, top of page
"In western North America, A. fascicularis (narrow-leaved milkweed) occurs on roadsides, hills and valleys, typically in moist soil or near irrigated fields across a range of states including Idaho, Utah, and Nevada, to the Pacific Coast (Woodson, 1954). Similarly, A. speciosa (showy milkweed) prefers moist, sandy soils and prairie habitats and occurs across the western plains states to the Pacific Coast. Both A. speciosa and A. fascicularis can co-occur in the same habitats, including irrigated fields and roadside ditches, and are not generally temporally isolated (Woodson, 1954)."

[Paul Cherubini]

http://altizerlab.uga.edu/Publications/PDFs/LadnerAltizer2005.pdf
Page 11 end of page, Page 12, top of page
"In western North America, A. fascicularis (narrow-leaved milkweed) occurs on roadsides, hills and valleys, typically in moist soil or near irrigated fields across a range of states including Idaho, Utah, and Nevada, to the Pacific Coast (Woodson, 1954). Similarly, A. speciosa (showy milkweed) prefers moist, sandy soils and prairie habitats and occurs across the western plains states to the Pacific Coast. Both A. speciosa and A. fascicularis can co-occur in the same habitats, including irrigated fields and roadside ditches, and are not generally temporally isolated (Woodson, 1954)."

There you have it...independent confirmation by milkweed expert and botanist Dr. Robert Woodson of what I have been saying all along - that the most abundant species of milkweed in the West - speciosa and fascicularis - grow abundantly along roadsides and in and around irrigated crops and livestock pastures. Yet neither the Xerces Society nor the Monarch Joint Venture nor the Bring Back The Monarch Campaign has announced plans to either protect or restore milkweed patches in those kinds of habitats. Thus those habitats will continue to be lost on a landscape scale which in turn means fewer western monarchs in the future.

[Mona Miller]

The problem is that Woodson's study was done in 1954. What has happened to the roadways since then?

More mowing, more herbicide/pesticide use. More development, more highways. What does this do to the quantity of milkweed? Less milkweed. Is there any benefit to trying to replant those roadways? No, unless mowing and the use of herbicides/pesticides can be managed.

But, if property owners plant milkweed those plantings won't be subjected to being destroyed like it would be if they tried to plant it on roadways and in ditches.

There are also conservation areas that can be used to plant milkweed, too.

Paul, I really am tired of your continued attitude towards conservation groups. I am tired of your depressing attitude whenever anyone gets excited about the possibility of planting milkweed and having to read your doom and gloom response that says that people/organizations aren't doing enough.

You know what excites me. Hearing about people like Bill having a plan and working hard to establish milkweed. About Michael (an 11 year old) and his friends in Naples, FL planting milkweed and raising monarchs.

Keep up the good work. All these efforts will help save Monarch butterflies.

[Paul Cherubini]

The problem is that Woodson's study was done in 1954. What has happened to the roadways since then? More mowing, more herbicide/pesticide use. Is there any benefit to trying to replant those roadways? No, unless mowing and the use of herbicides/pesticides can be managed.

I havn't seen much evidence that Xerces, Bring Back the Monarch Campaign, etc are doing much to stop that amount of mowing and roadside spraying. Prior to the 1990's milkweed flourished because of less frequent mowing and spraying along roadsides railway lines, pastures and farm irrigation ditches. So why don't these groups try to convince government agencies and property owners to go back to the pre-1990's way of doing things? They havn't said specifically what efforts they have made in that regard in each state or given us progress reports, etc. And if I post photos of the locations of harmful mowing here in Calif., they don't try to do anything to stop it.

But, if property owners plant milkweed those plantings won't be subjected to being destroyed like it would be if they tried to plant it on roadways and in ditches. There are also conservation areas that can be used to plant milkweed, too.

As I have previously explained, only a miniscule percentage of property owners want to plant milkweed (only a handful have planted milkweed in city (Lawrence, Kansas) where the Monarch Watch headquarters are located). And the conservation areas you speak of are few and far between. Therefore those efforts cannot offset a mathematically significant amount of milkweed biomass being lost along the roadways, etc. Thus monarch numbers will continue to decline at the same pace they have in the past.

Paul, I really am tired of your continued attitude towards conservation groups. I am tired of your depressing attitude whenever anyone gets excited about the possibility of planting milkweed and having to read your doom and gloom response that says that people/organizations aren't doing enough.

I'm just pointing out the facts that people/organizations aren't doing enough to offset even one tenth of one percent of the milkweed biomass being lost along the roadways, etc. As usual, you have a double standard; i.e. you have not said you are tired of the monarch scientists who say more deeply depressing things than I do; e.g. they talk about the possible imminent collapse of the monarch migration: Butterflies On The Brink: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_Y9CKP1DuQ

I argue the opposite; that elsewhere in the world (Spain, Portugal, New Zealand, Australia] the monarch migrations persist even when the sizes of the overwintering colonies are reduced to mere dozens or hundreds of butterflies.