First butterfly!

[Mom2RJA]

We have our first butterfly! It's a girl. My daughter and I got to watch her emerge this afternoon, along with a friend and her daughter. Their family has just started raising monarchs and they had never seen one emerge (after several missed attempts with our butterflies last summer), so that was very exciting!

Here she is, along with her chrysalis siblings:



Do you think I should release her this afternoon (almost 5:00 here in Michigan, with 50 degree low predicted overnight) or give her some watermelon and hold her until tomorrow? I might have a mate to release with her if I wait (I haven't seen any monarchs around here), but they are probably siblings (found on the same milkweed plant and hatched the same day). Does that matter?

[Mona Miller]

Usually it is best to wait 24 hours before releasing so the wings have a chance to harden. They don't need to eat the first day. If she gets antsy and is hurting her wings, put her into a dark room.

[Mom2RJA]

Thanks. I'll keep her overnight.

Do I need to worry at all about genetic diversity as far as releasing siblings together? I know they would be together in the wild, but most of them probably wouldn't have survived, and nobody would be holding them to release together, so I do feel like I'm manipulating the circumstances enough to think about this.

[blazing star]

I'm not certain, but it's my educated guess that they do not release pheromones until they are a little more mature; not when they are newly emerged. I think you're ok releasing together. That's just a guess.

I just googled to see and it appears that reproductive monarchs only live 5 weeks.

Good question. Does anyone know for certain?

[Mona Miller]

Thanks. I'll keep her overnight.
Do I need to worry at all about genetic diversity as far as releasing siblings together? I know they would be together in the wild, but most of them probably wouldn't have survived, and nobody would be holding them to release together, so I do feel like I'm manipulating the circumstances enough to think about this.

They take 3-5 days to mature enough to mate. Don't worry about siblings mating, they can mate a few times without causing any genetic problems.