Today was intended to be a day to finish a homework assignment and a paper, both due tomorrow. But, my husband awoke with other intentions. He was going to pick pears off of our trees that have suffered this season and attempt to dehydrate them. They are delicious, albeit very small. I was frank, bluntly…
As of last night, this monarch breeding season has allowed me to raise and release 13 adult monarch butterflies! That number is many times greater than than last year at this time, when I had only released one, on July 9th. Last year, although a great late season in tagging numbers, had a very slow…
Today, I made the rounds on our fruit trees. The cherry trees in our front yard were picked clean by birds while we were away at our cabin for a few days. The 8 cups I picked last Thursday and just finished processing today are all we will have from this year’s cherry harvest! Sorry…
There is another butterfly for whom I provide habitat here in Wisconsin. I learned of this butterfly shortly after moving here. It is the tiny Karner Blue. The silvery blue Karner Blue has weathered the storm of federal endangerment. It was listed as Federally Endangered in 1992. But, in Wisconsin, where I believe the largest…
Exciting News! The milkweed is up in my garden at home and the gardens at school! Here are some photographs from yesterday. Mother Nature Provides Milkweed erupts in the spring prior to the arrival of the Monarchs. This is Mother Nature’s way of ensuring that once the Butterflies arrive from their Journey Northward (migrating north…
For the last three years, I have tagged Monarch Butterflies. Having raised these fascinating, and now troubled, iconic creatures for the last 15 years, I took on the task of tagging their hind wings in the late summer/fall of 2015. I was hooked! It was easy and fun! I was acting as a contributing citizen…
The WordPress Weekly Photo Challenge is for this week is to represent the word Awakening. The first photo that sprung to mind is the eruption of milkweed in my monarch habitat garden in the spring. Usually, the itch gets too much to bear and forces me to go looking for this sign of spring. It…
When this challenge was first posted, I was at a loss as to what I could share. Then, I remembered the thousands of photographs I have taken of the various stages of the Monarch Butterfly’s life cycle. My favorite stage is the third stage, the pupa, or chrysalis! I have been raising monarchs for 14…