Western Monarch Day 2025 is on Wednesday, February 5, 2025: why are there so many monarch butterflies around these days?

Wednesday, February 5, 2025 is Western Monarch Day 2025. Monarch Butterflies of Pismo Beach, California Western Monarch Day Video

For Western Monarch Day, we’re not honoring Full Elizabeth and buddies, however the annual migratory return from the Western Monarch butterfly towards the central Californian coast. The Western Monarch includes a beautiful, distinctive pattern of amber and black on its wings, creating almost a stained glass window effect. It lives towards the west from the Rocky Mountain Range and fly south to California to outlive the wintertime.The species is thought to stay in decline, so individuals living across the migratory route, can celebrate Western Monarch Day by making certain you will find lots of flowering plants, especially milkweed within their yards to cause them to become visit.Western Monarch Day is well known in California with occasions centering around Pismo Condition Beach, where most of the seeing stars spend their winter several weeks. Site visitors can observe the seeing stars, find out more about them which help to plant plant life to assist create safe habitats.

Monarchs are especially noted for their lengthy annual migration. They make massive southward migrations from August through October. A northward migration takes place in the spring. Female Monarchs deposit eggs for the next generation during these migrations. The population east of the Rocky Mountains overwinters in the sanctuary in Angangueo, Michoacán, Mexico, and the western population overwinters in various sites in central coastal California, United States, notably in Pacific Grove and Santa Cruz. The length of these journeys far exceeds the lifetime of most Monarchs, which is less than two months for butterflies born in early summer. The last generation of the summer lives up to 7 months, during which it flies to the overwinter location. This generation does not reproduce until it leaves the overwinter location the following spring, but it is actually this generation's children and great-grandchildren that return to their northern location in the spring. How the species manages to return to the same overwintering spots over a gap of several generations is still a subject of research; the flight patterns are inherited, based on a combination of circadian rhythm and the position of the sun on the sky.[1]

Monarch Butterfly Report?

The monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus), a brightly patterned black and orange butterfly, is one of the most fascinating insects in the world. This familiar butterfly has a life cycle involving four distinct stages: egg, larva, pupa and adult butterfly. This is known as complete metamorphosis. Eggs are oval shaped and translucent green in color. Larva are horizontally striped with black, white and yellow. Pupae are a brilliant green colour, with a gold band near their silk point of attachment to a leaf or branch. The adult monarch is orange with black stripes radiating from the point of attachment of the wings to the thorax. The black edges of the wings are dotted with white spots. Males are distinguishable from females by the presence of black coloured scent glands on each of their hind wings. Monarchs breed in the northern United States and southern Canada. Western populations of adults, which emerge late in the season, migrate to California, and eastern populations migrate to the Sierra Madre mountains in Mexico to overwinter, or spend the winter.

Monarch butterflies are totally dependent on milkweed during their larval stage. After eating the egg from which they hatch, the tiny caterpillar begins eating milkweed leaves. The larva are eating machines and grow rapidly. In the two weeks following hatching, the caterpillar sheds its skin four times as it grows too large for its skin.

After only two weeks it is about two inches, or five cm long, and 3,000 times its birth weight! The caterpillar is ready for its change into the chrysalis, or pupal stage. The caterpillar spins a silk button in a sheltered spot such as the underside of a leaf. Attaching itself firmly to the silk, it hangs head down in a characteristic J-shape, and begins transformation into the pupa. The pupa does not eat. Inside the casing, the adult butterfly develops from the reserves built up by the caterpillar. The monarch emerges from the pupa in approximately five days. After pumping fluid into its wings, and waiting for them to harden, it is ready to fly. The adult butterfly has no mandibles (grasping mouth parts), feeding instead with its long tongue, called a proboscis. Adults feed on nectar, sap, juices and dew, and prior to migration build up large reserves of fat.

Monarchs have evolved a special means by which to avoid being eaten by predators. The sap of the milkweed that they eat as a caterpillar contains a chemical which tastes terrible to most birds. Birds attempting to eat a monarch butterfly soon spit it out. A monarch's bright colors are a signal to predators of its bad taste. In addition, viceroy butterflies, which are unrelated to monarchs but look almost exactly like them, are not bad tasting to birds, but may have evolved to look like monarchs and thereby avoid being eaten.

Monarch Migration

The mystery of monarch migration was solved by the use of lightweight wing tags, which directed people who found tagged monarchs to send them to Dr. Fred Urquhart at the University of Toronto. Records of tagged butterflies were then tracked and their migratory route determined. After several years of searching, the first winter location of monarch butterflies was discovered in 1975 in the Sierra Madre mountains west of Mexico City. Monarchs are believed to guide themselves during migration using the position of the sun and the magnetic field of the earth.

Life Cycle

During the summer, female monarchs look for milkweed plants in meadows, along roadsides, and abandoned farmers' fields of the northern United States and southern Canada. Females lay their eggs only on milkweed plants, and each female lays about 400 clear green oval eggs. The monarch egg is no bigger than the head of a pin, and is attached to the underside of a milkweed leaf. Within a few days, the egg hatches and a yellow, black and white striped caterpillar emerges, beginning its life cycle. Like many insects, the monarch parents provide no care for their offspring.

Monarchs which breed early in the summer live only a few weeks. Adults die shortly after mating and laying eggs. Several generations of short lived monarchs are produced in early to mid summer. However, in late August, shorter days and colder temperatures cause the emerging monarchs to postpone reproductive maturity. This last generation of the summer will live for eight or nine months and travel over a thousand miles to Mexico, a place they have never been before. Before migrating, monarchs gather in huge numbers at departure points such as Presqu'ile Provincial Park, on a peninsula sticking out into Lake Ontario.

In the spring, the eight or nine month old monarchs reach sexual maturity, and begin migrating in a north-eastern direction to the southern U.S. They mate all along the migratory route. Unlike their marathon journey south the previous fall, they do not complete the trip, passing this responsibility on to their offspring.

Threats to Monarchs

The largest threat to the monarch butterfly is human activities within their wintering grounds. While widespread on their summering grounds, the butterflies are highly concentrated and vulnerable to threats in wintering areas. Habitat destruction and changes caused by logging are a constant threat. The Sierra Madre wintering sites of the monarch are close to Mexico City in an area under heavy development pressure. Since 1986, several of the sites occupied by the overwintering monarch butterfly have been protected by the Mexican government, but even though they are supposed to be protected, some forested areas have been logged. Of the five protected areas, one has already been seriously damaged by excessive logging, and the monarchs do not seem to form their colonies there any more.

In California, where many western monarchs overwinter, the effects of tourism and poorly planned management and development are a problem, and at least seven of the 80 known monarch sites have already been destroyed. Milkweed is widespread and abundant in Canada and the United States, and is often considered a weed. Some researchers have expressed concern that the spraying of pesticides for weed control are killing milkweed plants and may be endangering the habitat and food source of the beautiful monarch butterfly.

Are you aware today(October 12)is Columbus Day?

Yes Columbus Day is today and it is celebrated next monday in the US. In Spain it is the national festivity, Spain day. They celebrate the mission of the discoverment of Americas and link of cultures with them.