HELP

[Teresa]

I'm new here but i've been raising monarchs for about 4 years. For the first time I came home tonight to one that was born while I was at work. I found it on the bottom of the cage already dried and it's wings crumpled. I want to save it. What should I do? I got two pieces of hard paper and flatten it's wings out and put it in the fidge. I'm hoping that will give the wings a chance to flatten. Has anyone ever had this happen?

Thanks for any help you can give

Jaboa

[Jim]

Welcome to the forums Jaboa!

Unfortunately, the first 10 minutes or so after the adult monarch emerges from the chrysalis are critical. If it is unable to hang and pump fluid into its wings to expand them during that time the wings will dry crumpled and this cannot be undone. However, if the butterfly appears healthy otherwise, you can feed it with fresh cut flowers or an artificial nectar and it may live a month or more.

As for the reason this happened, it is difficult to say since there are a number of things that could have caused it. It may be as simple as it didn't have a rough surface to climb up on and hang or a bit more complex as some sort of disease.

Hope this helps a bit!

BTW - how many monarchs are you raising right now? Have you had any other emergence problems?

[Teresa]

This is the first time i've had trouble. Every year i've had about 12 -15 monarchs. This year I have 4! I've tagged one already and have 2 left to come out. I know this second one will never fly I'm upset because this is the first year I bought a tagging kit and expected to have alot more. I've gone out to wild milkweed and never found a one. I did plant alot more milkweed this summer so hopefully next year i'll have alot more to tag. Thanks for your help!

Jaboa

[ohiomonarchmama]

I share your frustration as I am foster mom to a little butterfly with crumpled wings that emerged 5 days ago. My other monarchs this summer were raised from eggs found on milkweed in my own garden (strategicallly placed next to butterfly bushes!). 5 of the seven were fine, one seemed to not be able to grow or shed it's skin, and the other had the container accidently dropped by a neighbor while it was in "J" formation, which was quite sad. I tagged the survivors...my first time for trying that, so I'm very anxious. Back to your question...the one I have now with crumpled wings was a student's who got it at a garden store's fall festival. The class watched it hatch, but it never really unfolded it's wings. It had plenty of room to hang. The fluid dripped to the bottom of the container. Since it emerged later in the afternoon, I expected it to be "normal" when we came in the next day, but it still had the crumpled wings. I gave it some sugar water (it had some butterfly bush blossoms in it's container already). It drank, but then dripped some more. It was almost as if there was a problem with the "connection" for the fluid to flow from the body to the wings. Since I only saw it from the day it hatched, I have no idea what happened before that which might have affected it's development. It seems fine so far in regards to the body, but of course will never fly, so I am taking care of it. I have let it sun itself on my butterly bush when it's been warmer, but had it inside today because of temperatures. It will be interesting to see how long it lives. I am offering sugar water twice a day. If anyone has better suggestions, let me know.

[Sarah]

We recommend using gatorade. You can place it in a shallow dish with a clean plastic potscrubber or you can offer it in a cotton ball. You should make sure to change the shallow dish/cotton ball every other day to avoid fermentation. We've had a few students toss around the idea of whether or not monarchs seem to prefer a certain flavor, but no one has sent us ther results yet.

One extra piece of info -- monarchs kept inside and fed tend to live 2-6 weeks, which is the same amount of time as summer reproductives.

[monarchrose]

This may seem cruel, but in my opinion it is just the opposite. I believe that euthanasia is the kind thing to do in cases like this. I have tried putting the insect to sleep in the refrigerator and then, when asleep flattening the wings between the pages of a thick book. I have tried repairing torn wings with left over migration stickers. None of these efforts worked, and in the end I always killed the insect quickly. Another butterfly was born with asymmetrical wings, probably because the chrysalis fell and rested on the classroom counter all weekend. I hung the chrysalis back up on Monday, but the damage was done. As we all know, flight is impossible with asymmetrical wings. We make Tinkerbelle a nice cage with flowers and food. Yes, Gatorade is the best, and melon is a popular flavor. But every afternoon she would try her best to fly. I believe that she knew it was important for her to migrate. As she bashed against the glass, her wings became tattered and torn. It became difficult for her to even move around the cage. After several days of this, I whispered that I was sorry, and killed her.

[Keith Petrosky]

When I caught my first monarch, I accidently hit it with the net, cutting it's abdomen open. A yellow ooze came out, and I thought it was the end. I gently pushed the side, to get rid of the dried stuff. I put the monarch in a large cage, and put flowers and sugar water at the bottom. That night, the butterfly was motionless, I thought it was dead. I kept it in their, because it was dark and late. I woke up the next morning, and the butterfly was climbing around the cage, and the open wound was sealed shut! The butterfly did not try to fly, but I did not give up hope. I brought it outside, and it was a cold day, but I figured it would warm up. I tossed the butterfly in the air for an hour, and everytime the wind would blow, the butterfly would flap its wings, a little stronger each time. After an hour, the butterfly would flap its wings when it was on the ground, I thought it would take off. Unfortunetly, it stopped flapping, and layed their. Now I surely thought it was going to die. I put it on a clover, and let it stay their for 2 hours, I tagged it, and left. I came back when it was warmer, and I saw the butterfly walking from flower to flower. I tried the flying thing again, and it actually started to fly! After 15 minutes, the butterfly flew on it's own, and took off into the sun! I never got a response if anyone found it's tag, but it just goes to show, if you dont give up, miracles can happen!