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Posts Tagged: monarch butterfly
Those Iconic Monarchs: Treats on Halloween and Every Other Day
It's Halloween and scores of trick-or-treaters are donning monarch butterfly costumes. But they can't do justice to the living monarchs, those...
A newly eclosed monarch, ready to take flight. This image was taken on Sept. 24, 2018 in Vacaville, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Spreading her wings on a Mexican sunflower (Tithonia), the newly released Monarch is about to take flight. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
A monarch sips nectar from a Mexican sunflower (Tithonia). (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Independence Day for a Monarch
Have you ever seen a monarch butterfly eclose? It's a magical moment. First an egg, then a caterpillar, then a chrysalis, and then a butterfly,...
The monarch chrysalis bulges, a sure sign that eclosure is imminent. At right is a newly formed green chrysalis. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Out it slides. Swoosh! (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Time to wiggle around. Welcome to the world! (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Time to pump up the wings. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Just you wait, soon I'll be a familiar looking butterfly. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
I'm swinging and swaying. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Ah, as soon as I dry, I'll be off and long gone. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Once Upon a Monarch...
We first saw her at 10 a.m. on Oct. 27, 2017. She was eating. That's what monarch caterpillars do best. They eat. A lot. "Where have you been?" I...
A monarch caterpillar dines on tropical milkweed on Oct. 27, 2017 in Vacaville, Calif. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
The monarch caterpillar, found Oct. 27 on milkweed in Vacaville, Calif., formed this chrysalis on Nov. 4. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
On Nov. 22, the chrysalis darkened, revealing the iconic orange, black and white wings of the monarch in all its transparency. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
On Nov. 22, the monarch eclosed. It's a girl! Here she clings to her pupal case. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Monarch Mom Rita LeRoy, farm keeper at Loma Vista Farm, Vallejo, is ready to release the Vacaville-born and reared monarch at the butterfly sanctuary at Natural Bridges State Park, Santa Cruz, on Nov. 24.
The Making of a Monarch
If you're addicted to monarchs--and lament that they're overwintering in coastal California and in central Mexico and nowhere near you--no...
A monarch butterfly on a Mexican sunflower (Tithonia). Monarch puppets are available at the Bohart Museum of Entomology. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Monarch t-shirts at the Bohart Museum of Entomology ask the question: "Got milkweed?" Milkweed is the host plant of monarchs; monarchs lay their eggs only on milkweed and caterpillars eat only milkweed. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Drama in the Pollinator Patch
So here's this newly eclosed male monarch trying to sip a little nectar from a Mexican sunflower (Tithonia). A female longhorned bee, probably...
A pollen-packing female longhorned bee, probably Melissodes agilis (as identified by Robbin Thorp, emeritus professor of entomology at UC Davis) wants the same flower that the male monarch has claimed. This is a Mexican sunflower, genus Tithonia. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
Just a blur, a male longhorned bee, probably Meliossodes agilis, targets a monarch. The monarch's wings are deformed; they did not fully expand. (Photo by Kathy Keatley Garvey)
