Raising Book Resources
Raising Hope for the 2020 Migration- Raise the Migration Results
Raise The Migration is an annual North American challenge to raise monarch butterflies to release for fall’s annual monarch migration. The time has come to share your 2020 experience and raise it forward…
The raising season is coming to an end, so we’d love to hear how many butterflies you released for fall’s annual 2020 monarch migration…and more importantly, what lessons you’ve learned through this amazing raising experience?
If you’ve still got some raising to do, raise on! But please post in the comment box at the bottom of this page after you’ve released your last butterfly.
Every year, I start Raise The Migration in early August, but monarchs raised at that time aren’t actually migration generation butterflies…they’re actually the parents to that amazing generation of travelers.
There’s no way to tell whether butterflies will mate or migrate, but one telltale sign of a migration generation butterfly is its size, which is dependent on how much the caterpillar eats. The first super-sized caterpillars start to form chrysalides around the first week of September in our northern region…
In the garden, you can tell non-migratory butterflies by their worn out wings. Non-migratory males are also more aggressive, chasing off potential competition while seeking out female companionship…migratory monarchs are in sexual diapause and only interested in stocking up on nectar for the long journey ahead.
So how did our Raise The Migration Monarchs fare this season and what lessons did we learn raising forward?
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If you’re interested in a step-by-step guide digital guide with free updates (before each monarch season begins in spring) please check out the monarch raising guide by clicking this butterfly photo:
For anyone who purchases the guide (or any other item) from Monarch Butterfly Life, you will be invited to our closed facebook group where you can discuss raising monarchs with other raisers and post your photos.
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Here are Raise the Migration results from the past seven seasons:
2019- 81% survival rate
2018- 93% survival rate
2017- 100% survival rate
2016- 96% survial rate
2015- 96% survival rate
2014- 90% survival rate
2013- 100% survival rate
As you can see from the results, this raising system is consistently producing healthy monarchs to help support the struggling monarch population.
Raise The Migration 2020 Results
I am counting our 2020 migration generation as all butterflies that eclosed September 1st and after.
Caterpillar Escapes
Since using food container hatcheries for eggs and baby caterpillars, this has helped us to easily keep track of the wee cats until they can be placed in the larger mesh cages. We have not lost a caterpillar for years...
Unexplained Caterpillar Deaths
None to report in 2020
Caterpillar Diseases and Parasites?
There were no caterpillar disease issues to report in 2020. Check out a pre and post molt of one caterpillar graduating from instar 3 to instar 4:
Accidental Deaths?
There have been two accidental deaths this year...seems fitting for 2020. 🙃
1. This was an odd fluke that happened in an egg hatchery. There was one container with two eggs that looked like they might have fungus issues from the leaves I found them on.
After monitoring, I thought one of the eggs had succumbed to a rust-like fungus that was growing around it. Little did I know, the caterpillar had hatched and crawled under the paper towel that lined the hatchery....there was even a fresh milkweed leaf under the fungusy leaf piece.
This has never happened before so I was shocked to find the dead baby cat as I cleared out the hatchery.
2. On a cold morning in the 3-season porch (low was 40° F), I picked up the floral tube/racks (with milkweed and caterpillars) and walked it into the kitchen without using the boot tray. Two of the cold, lethargic caterpillars fell to the floor. I rescued one...and stepped on the other. 😔
Chrysalis Problems
Chrysalis formation was perfect this season. I conducted 6 removing/rehanging experiments this year: 3 chrysalides hung up with pins, 2 hung up on a microfiber cloth, and 1 taped to the floor:
All 6 butterflies eclosed with no issues and the butterflies were released to join the 2020 monarch migration. The last male emerged Sunday October 11th, and was released on Monday October 12th:
Butterfly Eclosures
All butterflies emerged from their monarch chrysalises without issue.
Final Results
2 accidental deaths
0 disease or parasite issues
0 unexplained death
4 healthy males
5 healthy females
82% survival rate
Lessons Learned?
Of the two caterpillar accidents that occurred this season, one was a fluke that will likely never happen again.
However, the 'stepping' accident could have been easily avoided if I would have just followed my own advice for caterpillar safety. If moving caterpillars outside of the cage, place them on a boot tray so they will never fall on the floor.
I also learned that keeping chrysalides in the 3 season porch at night (during the fall) is a bad idea for our northern region. Cool night time temps slowed down metamorphosis by at least a week, meaning the excellent window I had to release butterflies in warm weather, quickly shrunk to just a few days.
The chrysalises get plenty of exposure to natural lighting and temperatures during the day through open windows. If these monarchs would have been left to fend for themselves outside, their wintry fate would have been sealed...🥶
Also, my preferred way of rehanging chrysalides is pinning the silk to the top of the cage. Really though, all 3 methods work well, so do what you're most comfortable with when you need to rehang a chrysalis.
August 2020 Migration Memory
And now, here’s the part I’m most excited about…hearing about all the valuable lessons you learned raising monarchs over the past few weeks!
Share Your Results?!
Please share your results below by letting us know how many monarchs you released to help boost the struggling monarch population…remember to include your location.
More importantly, please share the most valuable lesson(s) you learned about raising monarch butterflies, that you believe can help others raising forward.
Thank you for helping to Raise the Migration in 2020
348 comments
I live in Oneonta NY. This was my first year. I started this because last year a customer on my mail route said to me “you should have seen our garden yesterday, about 100 monarchs were flying around and were hiding in our flowers during the rain” and I said to myself “I want that too!” So this year I found several cats and eggs on the milkweed plants in my yard. However, I found even more along my mail route. I started bringing along a couple travel coffee mugs, 1 for cats & 1 for eggs. After all was said and done, I found a total of 72 and released 65 monarchs, 7 didn’t make it. I even started giving the younger children on my route chrysalis “kits” A few days before the chrysalis was due to “hatch” I would suspend it on a string in a dollar store Halloween bucket, put a small piece of screen on top and let the kids keep & release. What did I learn? That I LOVE doing this! Also, I found that I had more success finding eggs and cats on milkweed that was further away from other flowers. I guess because less competition from other bugs gives the monarch lady more time to lay her eggs in peace?
I shared my success story here a couple of days ago but wanted to add one more thing that I think is important. Unwanted pests! I took a sprig of milkweed that happened to have some flower buds on it, checked it over good, rinsed it off, put it in a floral tube, then put two baby 1-instar caterpillars on it. When I went to check on them the next day, they were gone! You know how tiny 1-instar cats are so I started carefully going through the flower buds on top looking for them and that’s when I found an evil little baby praying mantis, only about 1/4 inch long. He ate my baby cats! Another pesky bug: aphids. I had heard that planting garlic would help keep them away and I really believe this works! I planted garlic in late fall last year and this year I only had a couple of very small outbreaks of aphids, easy to control and get rid of, compared to last year when they tried to take over the entire garden. Garlic seems to chase off aphids in about a 10 foot radius around the plant. I tried chives last year and they weren’t nearly as effective. I also tried marigolds last year and they didn’t work either, but I planted them again this year because they’re a great nectar flower. In spite of last year being a bad year for tachinid flies, I did not have one case of any infestations this year, which was a relief. I did have problems with trichogramma wasps infecting eggs this year. About 20% of the eggs I brought in were infected. It seems the only eggs that survived were the ones I found right after they were laid. If I didn’t find the egg for a day or two, it was usually already infected. As I mentioned before, we had a 90% success rate (not counting infected eggs that were already dead when brought inside). About 5% of the fatalities were due to Mother Nature and about 5% were due to stupid mistakes on my part (like my sacrificial offering to that baby praying mantis).
It’s been a great year, I’ve still got 6 monarch chrysalis, once they emerge I will have released over 100 monarch butterfly’s! The majority of the caterpillars were found on my milkweed in late August early September. I’ve also been raising black swallowtails releasing around 25 of them. Even though I have 3 varieties of milkweed in my garden I definitely need to plant more in the spring, as well as planting more parsley and fennel for the swallowtails.
Two years ago, I moved from my home where I had a Monarch Waystation and where I learned what I know (and of course, through Tony’s info) to a condo a couple of miles away. The first year I devoted to becoming a balcony gardener on the second floor and focused on hummingbirds. I noticed however, that the State Fair Zinnias (the only flowers we have) were getting a lot of Monarch visitors. Glad I kept my pop-ups because I bought a beautiful bouquet of Butterfly weed and noticed what I thought were eggs. They were not, but this got me going. I had already planted more State Fair Zinnias on my balcony and had fuschia and Manndevilla. I bought a pot of swamp milkweed and found two cats, one instar 2 and one at 3. I put them in separate habitats since I didn’t know how my experiment would work. The first, a female ate, went into J, and eclosed like she was reading the text book. I even got her eclosure on video. It was a beautiful sunny day and when I opened the flap, she flew to one of my zinnias and I was so happy. Then, about 10 days-2 weeks later, a beautiful male eclosed. I won’t use this habitat again for a chrysalis because it is small, it has a wooden top and I didn’t have visual access like I do with the ones Tony’s carries in his store. However, this boy came out so fast and flew high up to one of the Austrian pines. I swear he is still hanging around here. Thank you Tony!
After having great success in spring releasing 23 healthy monarchs from cats I found on my common milkweed plants, no others were found after. We had very hot dry weather here in SW Ontario, Canada and wonder if that impacted the health of the plants. It was also noted that numbers of monarchs were way down this year. The plants seemed healthy with a couple that had aphids which I snipped off. I am quite disappointed that I wasn’t able to raise any super gen monarchs this year. 😢