Saved some monarchs

[GonativeAlex]

Well I was told at my day program to pull some weeds for my assistanceship.( where I work) And I found 6 monarch eggs on some milkweed. I put the leaves in a plastic sand which bag and then when I got home transfered them to a bigger bag, I put in a damp paper towel and now they recide in my room. I don't know when they were laid but I'm sure I will have cats in about 5 days to a week.

[dapjwy]

How cool. Do you have any milkweed for them to eat? Can you tranfer them to your own plants? Or do you have a source for collecting milkweed to bring to them?

[GonativeAlex]

Sense my milkweeds are young and either rare or orimental- Poke, purple and butterfly weed are either very rare or extinct in the wild where I'm from. used to draw them in but not to raise them, I'll raise them on common. I know plenty of parks where common is plentiful. I'll use swamp if staff cant or wont take me to the park to get milkweed leaves.


I may go to a como native garden and collect eggs there today if the storms clear up.

[Rebek56]

Good luck, Alex. I've never watched the process from eggs before.

[GonativeAlex]

I've done it before lots of times its really quite easy if you know what to look for.

[dapjwy]

Glad you have a plan...and experience.

[GonativeAlex]

Well today 5 hatchling's were eating milkweed leaves. I transfered them to a larger grow out jar. I found another batch of 6 or so eggs at work, plus I noticed some eggs on my poke milkweed.. Raising them going to be fun... wish me luck.

[Hedgerowe]

Best of luck to you, Alex!

[GonativeAlex]

Well now I have though 11 I started with plus about 40 more, as eggs or young larvae all from the same place. Some of the largest ones are starting the process of j hooking, I have those ones in a 20 gallon fish tank. I have over 20 smaller ones and over 20 eggs/hatchling's.


I have found an area by me a local prarire restoration where I gather milkweed. I also fish the ponds there for sunfish and bass.


So far so good I plan on releasing them in my front yard.

[Equilibrium]

What about adding some more milkweed to your garden plantings.... that way you wouldn't have to "gather" from a restoration project. I dunno much about raising monarchs but I'm thinking maybe it would be better if they were released in an area that has a sufficient quantity of established milkweed plants rather than a residential area where there's probably only a spattering of plants? I keep reading how 2nd and 3rd generations are possible if they're released in an area where there's plenty of their "life" plants to lay eggs on after they mate and.... monarchs have definitely been hit hard the last coupla years.