About Monarch Butterflies.  We’ve released over 20 Butterflies in the last two days.  We brought many of the Chrysalises indoors during the last cold spell (cold for Houston, not cold for anywhere else in the U.S.) and they have really flourished.  I’ve also been helping out someone I recently met by doing some testing for the OE (ophryocystis elektroscirrha) parasite.

Without further adieu, here’s a few pictures using the new lens and of the first Monarchs of 2012.

Monarch Caterpillar Eating Milkweed In Early Morning Dew

Recently Tested Monarch On Tree

Multiple Monarchs Drying Their Wings After Hatching

First Monarch Of 2012 Drying Wings In The Sun

What I’ve also noticed is that these Butterflies are mating, and in the case of other males, chasing each other.

Monarch With With Wings Spread Wide In Early Morning Sun

Clean Monarch Butterfly Feeding On Red Zinnia

We’ve also located several (around 15 at last count) Monarch Caterpillars on the Milkweed.  The two guys are the picture below were so tiny I almost didn’t see them.  It’s been like this for several days; we check the Milkweed for Caterpillars, see none, and assume there are none.  Two days later, we see little Caterpillars like these.

Two Tiny Monarch Caterpillars Feeding Off Same Leaf

There are also several large Caterpillars on the Milkweed.  I brought them inside for one day since it was a little chilly, then took them back outside the next day since the weather has been really nice.

Large Monarch Caterpillar Upside Down In Between Two Milkweed Stems

Another little interesting tidbit.  Whereas the big Fall Monarch Migration of 2011 have had reports of the Monarchs in Texas, to the best of my knowledge no large colonies have been seen around the Houston area, nor have any of the folks I know reported seeing a big influx of Monarch Butterflies.  Personally I am expecting larger sightings of migrating Monarchs within the next 2 weeks.

If you’re reading this and located along the Texas Gulf Coast, have you been seeing Monarchs?  Let me know, I’m curious!

The picture below is just one of the 5 Monarch Caterpillars I found.  All but one are this size, so it would seem that some Monarchs visited the backyard 1-2 weeks ago.  The background are the flowers from our Zinnia garden.

Monarch Caterpillar On Milkweed Stem Against Zinnia Background

Monarch Caterpillars Fighting Over Milkweed

I was totally surprised when I went outside to check on them and found out that they were clustering on the two remaining Milkweed plants they had not already devoured.  I’m going to have to buy more Milkweed again.  I thought I would probably have enough, but now I’m not so sure.

I did see a Monarch Butterfly today but he/she never came close to where I was or at least where I could take a picture.  Perhaps tomorrow.

Large Butterfly Enclosure Protecting Monarch Caterpillars

There are six Milkweed plants in the Enclosure.  With so many Monarch Caterpillars, I don’t expect these plants to have many remaining leaves after a few day.  I still have a quite a few other Milkweed plants that I can rotate into the enclosure when the leaves have been eaten.

We stopped counting after 50, but if I had to guess, I’d say we have 55-60 Monarch Caterpillars right now.  Each time we check the Milkweed plants that are not in the enclosure, we tend to find another 1-2 Caterpillars.

Notice how they are roughly all the same size?  I think that’s because they all came from the first female Monarch we saw a few weeks ago.

Monarch Caterpillars Devouring Milkweed Plant

Additional Monarch Caterpillars On Milkweed Plant

The good news for the Caterpillars is that they should be safe from any predators.  The lizards are eyeing up the enclosure like crazy, but they shouldn’t be able to get in.  Although many birds tend to avoid the Monarch Caterpillars, I wanted to be on the safe side and protect them from any birds that might look for an easy meal, or those pesky red Paper Wasps.

I just checked some of our Milkweed plants tonight, and many of them are covered in Monarch Caterpillars.  The picture below is just one plant (and not one of our better ones) and I count 10 Monarch Caterpillars on this one.

Ten Monarch Caterpillars On Milkweed

On another plant, I counted at least 2.

Monarch Caterpillars Crawling Towards Newer Milkweed

Many of our other Milkweed plants also have Caterpillars but I haven’t had the chance to count them all.  From what I can tell, all of these eggs, and now Caterpillars, are from the single female Monarch we saw a few weeks ago.  In the latest update from Journey North, they are reporting that huge numbers are migrating out of Mexico and that the leading edge of the migration has already entered Oklahoma.  That being the case, I’m hopeful that we will see more Monarchs later this week (although I also may end up needing to buy more Milkweed).

I have a day 5 update on the Carolina Chickadee babies.  Of the original 6 eggs, five of them hatched, but only 4 chicks remain.  I’m not sure what happened to the other chick.  Do the parents remove a baby if it doesn’t survive?  I’m pretty sure it wasn’t due to a predator.

Although I wasn’t able to get any quality pictures, we had a flock of Cedar Waxwings land in my Maple Tree this evening.  We’ve noticed a flock of about a dozen flying overhead in the evenings, but have never seen them near the backyard before today.  Just for kicks, I’m going to put out some grapes and some jelly and see if I can get them to feed in the backyard.  I would love to take a good picture of one of them!

Check back starting tomorrow for new (and hopefully better quality) pictures of Butterflies, Caterpillars, and Birds.

First are the Eastern Black Swallowtail Caterpillars.  We have quite a few of these now, we’ve counted around 20, but our Fennel is so thick, I’m sure there are some we are missing.

In this picture, you can see 3 of them.  They are all around the same size.

Three Eastern Black Swallowtail Caterpillars On Fennel

This picture below is of a different Fennel plant.  In this picture you can only see two.  I’ll get my macro lens out soon and take some close up shots, as they way these Caterpillars look now is nothing how they look once they get a bit bigger.

Two Eastern Black Swallowtail Caterpillars On Fennel

Our Monarch Caterpillars are a bit tricky to get pictures of right now.  All of our Milkweed is quite small, as are the Caterpillars.  To the best of my knowledge, these Caterpillars are all from the same female Monarch that we saw a couple of weeks ago.  We haven’t seen one Monarch since then (which is rather strange actually).

Are other people seeing Monarchs right now in the Houston area?  I would have thought we would have seen several by now, but either they are visiting during the afternoon when we aren’t here, or they just haven’t been around.  I’m going to assume the latter, as we haven’t seen any new eggs on the Milkweed.

Young Monarch Caterpillars On New Milkweed

In other news, I have seen 3 Garter snakes this weekend.  One was about a foot long, and bit my hand the whole time I held it, another was about 2 feet long, and the third was again about 1 foot long.  I didn’t get pictures of those either, but I will, just wait!  I need Leecy’s help for that as I can’t photograph and hold a snake at the same time.

Lots of mating behaviors are starting to occur with the birds.  Males are competing with one another, and females are being chased all over the place.  There are about 10 Purple Martins in our Martin house, and about 20 overall.  The other 10 seem to hang around the house that’s a few doors down from mine where they have 4 Purple Martin houses (I’m jealous!).  I need to do a nest check in that Martin house, but they normally spend a few weeks getting to know one other before building their nest (at least from what I’ve observed in the past).

On a side note, especially for those that are new to Butterfly Gardening.  I’m noticing a lot of those red Paper Wasps.  They are notorious Caterpillar killers.  I’m contemplating covering the Caterpillars I can find to make sure they don’t get eaten.

Speaking of Monarch Butterflies, we currently have 8 Chrysalises, 2 Caterpillars (who are likely sick..I’ll explain shortly), and 4 adult Monarchs who just emerged from their Chrysalises today.

About the sick Caterpillars.  We’ve been running low on Milkweed so we purchased several one gallon plants the other day.  Finding Milkweed at any of the nurseries is a real challenge right now as it is January.  When we purchased these new plants, we cut off a couple of stalks to feed it to the 4 Caterpillars that we needed to feed.

Well, it appears the Milkweed was likely sprayed with some chemical.  One Caterpillar spent the last 24 hours writhing on the bottom of the enclosure.  I couldn’t stand watching that anymore, so I finally put it out of its misery and into the freezer.  Another Caterpillar that ate some of the new Milkweed actually formed the familiar “J” shape, but was having a heck of a time forming a Chrysalis.  I watched it most of the day, and it was bending and flexing in directions that I haven’t seen a Monarch Caterpillar do before.  Tonight, it made it to the Chrysalis stage, and it was a mess.  It was extremely misshapen, and fell off the top of the enclosure.  It was still wiggling several hours after it formed a Chrysalis, so I decided to put that one of its misery as well.

That leaves to Caterpillars who have spent the last day and a half just doing circles around the enclosure.  I removed the sprayed Milkweed and put in some Milkweed that was growing in the backyard that I know is safe.  These two Caterpillars haven’t touched it.  Even when I place them on the leaves, they crawl off and start wandering around.  My guess is that they are poisoned (although maybe not as much as the others were), but I seriously doubt they will make it.  They’re spending an enormous amount of energy crawling around the cage and never stop.

So what’s the lesson here?  Be careful on the Milkweed you buy.  I bought from a nursery I really trust, but these things can happen.  Strangely enough, I always like to see a few Aphids on Milkweed as that usually indicates the Milkweed has not been treated.  The nursery was told by the grower that they purchased it from that it was not treated.  Maybe it was, maybe it wasn’t, or maybe another plant was sprayed in their greenhouse and it landed on the Milkweed.  Just be careful is all I’m saying.  The only true way to know you are getting untreated Milkweed is to grow it yourself, but when it’s the middle of January, unless you have a greenhouse or are growing some indoors, you may not have a choice.

Now on to more positive news.  The Male Monarch that I released today spent several minutes sunning himself before flying off, and that gave me an opportunity to take a few pictures.

In this first picture, I was using my new 300 f2.8 lens without a teleconverter.

January Male Monarch Butterfly Sunning

In this second picture, I used the same lens, but added the 1.4x teleconverter.

January Male Monarch Butterfly Sunning Before Flight

Tomorrow (Saturday) it’s supposed to be a beautiful, sunny day, so Leecy and I are planning on taking a trip down to Brazos Bend State Park.  I may take the 4 Monarch Butterflies that eclosed today down there as well to release them.

Since the weather is supposed to be in the 60′s until the weekend, we are leaving the ones we found outside in the outdoor Butterfly enclosure.

Honestly it’s quite surprising we have so many Caterpillars, it’s January!  The good news is that all of the Caterpillars appear really healthy.  The bad news is we are quickly running out of Milkweed.  None of the leaves look that great, but they appear to be good enough for the Caterpillars and they are also nibbling on the seed pods.

I called Buchanan’s Native Plants this weekend to check on their Milkweed inventory, and they have none.  I also called Joshua’s Native Plants.  Joshua said they were hoping to get some Milkweed on Tuesday, so Leecy will drive over there tomorrow.

Monarch Caterpillar Curling Around Milkweed Seed Pod

Monarch Caterpillar Nibbling On Milkweed Seed Pod

We placed this male Monarch on this Pine branch.  He was very anxious to fly since he had been indoors and facing the sun.  After just a couple of shots, this guy thought he should try and fly.  He didn’t get very far.

Male Monarch Butterfly On Pine Branch

He flew into this big tree we have (I can’t recall the name off the top of my head) and faced towards the sun to continue to warm up.

Male Monarch Butterfly Warming Against Blue Sky

At first I thought, oh well, he took off and he’s too high for me to catch and bring back indoors.  He wasn’t in this location for more than 30 minutes before he flew back down to where I was and landed on the Bamboo (seriously).  I just reached up and grabbed him, and brought him back indoors.

I’m not sure how fond he is being in this Butterfly enclosure, but I bet he appreciates being indoors right now especially since it’s supposed to get down to 27 degrees tonight:-).

Strangely enough, we have quite a few Monarch Butterflies right now.  We’ve been releasing 1-2 Monarchs per day for the last couple of weeks.  In a way, this makes some sense.  In October and November, the Monarchs we saw were likely migrating to Mexico and had not yet mated.  The Monarch Butterflies we are seeing right now have definitely mated, and are laying lots of eggs.  As we find the Caterpillars, we bring them inside and give them fresh Milkweed.  Could these just be local Monarchs that spend much of their time in the warmer climates?  They definitely don’t appear to be as worn as the October/November Monarchs were.  Another little interesting tidbit.  The majority of the Monarchs that we have been releasing have been female.  I’d say the ratio is like 3:1.

Right now we have 2 female Monarchs that we should be able to release tomorrow, and there’s a good chance another 2-3 will become Butterflies by morning.

We also have several Gulf Fritillary Caterpillars, Chrysalises, and Butterflies.  We haven’t been bringing in as many Caterpillars from this species inside as they tend to hide a bit better than the Monarchs (at least in our yard).

We’ve had a few days of below freezing temperatures, but not for very long (typical of Houston).  We have been covering much of our outdoor Milkweed with a clear shower curtain (Leecy’s idea) and that appears to give the Milkweed sufficient light, protects them from frost, and also serves as a nice bit of insulation.

Fortunately for the Butterflies, we still have quite a few Nectar plants (Lantana, Milkweed, Penta, Mexican Flame Vine) that have been providing the necessary food that these insects require.

This upcoming week is also Christmas!  Leecy says she doesn’t want anything for Christmas and wants to do something for a needy family so we’re going shopping tomorrow to buy some presents for whomever we decide to give them to.  There is a family we are thinking about that have 3 kids, so we talked about buying 3 bikes for them.  My idea is just do drop the bikes off during Christmas Eve night and let them think it’s from Santa.  I’d prefer they not know they were from Leecy and I.

Also this upcoming week I’ll be receiving my rented Canon 300mm f2.8 lens.  I’m really looking forward to shooting with this lens.  If I like it, and I don’t end up taking that trip to Mexico, I’ll probably end up buying one early next year.

That’s about it on this end.  I’m going to try and take some pictures of the Monarch Butterflies that we’ll release tomorrow so check back if you’re interested in seeing the pictures.

Then I got up early this morning, and sat in this stool for another 3 hours waiting for this to occur and I finally got it!

Once again I continue to be amazed by these creatures.  This Caterpillar struggled for hours to loosen its skin.  At one point I thought the poor thing might just run out of energy.

I used a little creativity by adding some music and transitional text.  You’ll also notice that there are several other Monarch Chrysalises in the video.  It’s supposed to be a little chilly this week, so for those that eclose this week, they may be staying indoors for a few days.

So without further adieu, here’s the video.  The video runs about 3 1/2 minutes.

We have 13 Chrysalises, eggs all over the outside Milkweed, and probably 10 Caterpillars.  As we find the Caterpillars we bring them inside as the weather does occasionally get a little cold at night.  There are at least 3 Female Monarch Butterflies that alternate between getting nectar from the Milkweed and laying lots of eggs.  One particular Butterfly looks very tattered, but she is the one laying the most eggs.

Here’s some pictures from today.

Monarch Caterpillar On Milkweed Stem

Monarch Caterpillar Eating Milkweed Pod

This is the tattered female Monarch that is laying lots of eggs.

Tattered Monarch Getting Nectar And Laying Eggs

I spent 3 hours trying to record a Monarch Caterpillar moving to the Chrysalis stage, but it never happened.  Perhaps I’ll be able to capture that tomorrow.

The one I was trying to record is on the right, but since that didn’t work, I just took a picture of one of the Chrysalises who didn’t quite finish shedding its skin.

Monarch Chrysalis Next To Monarch Caterpillar

So today, in preparation for the cold, we decided to collect the Monarch Caterpillars and Gulf Fritillary Chrysalises and bring them inside.  Now that I think about it, I’m not sure why we didn’t bring in the Gulf Fritillary Caterpillars since we have tons of those right now.  Call it old age, or we just plain forgot.  Hopefully they will be okay until tomorrow.

Back to the Monarch Caterpillars.  As you can see from the picture, some are large, some small.  Three of them have already started hanging in the familiar “J” shape tonight.  We seem to find at least one new Caterpillar (Monarch) every day now.

Collection Of Monarch Caterpillars Brought In From Cold

For the Gulf Fritillary Chrysalises, we decided to bring these particular ones inside as they were the ones scattered around the hot tub and pool.  Although we only collected about 7 of these, I’m sure there are lots more out there based on the number of Caterpillars we have seen on the Passion Vine.

Collection Of Gulf Fritillary Chrysalises Brought In From Cold