Welcome to Rio Bravo Nature Center

Monarch Month - October 2010

TX Monarch Monitoring Project Event

Fall Monarch Migration Extravaganza!

Come help us celebrate and enjoy the Fall Migration through Maverick County on October 15th and 16th! Very Casual!

Friday schedule:

Morning:
1. Tour known roosting sites in Eagle Pass & Maverick County:
2. Learn to identify roost characteristics & locations
3. Help TX Monarch Monitoring Project estimate size of migration
(Spot counts--#s per hour) Various locations.

Lunch: M&M Taco Stand

Afternoon:
4. Tour Cunningham Ranch
5. Monitor milkweed for presence of late generation eggs & larvae
(Various locations Quemado Valley)

Late night:
6. Net monarch clusters for Saturday p.m. tagging, weighing, O.e. testing in city park

Saturday morning
1. 8 a.m. Canoe trip down Rio Grande (3 miles of leisurely paddling. 3 hrs.)
        (Limited to 24 participants. We have 6 large Scanoes and 3 kyacks. Welcome to
          bring your own [no charge!] Difficulty level: Anyone can do this; it's easy. $10 per
          person, funds go to Nature Center Youth Education Programs.)

Lunch: On your own

2. 2-4 p.m. tagging, weighing, testing for O.e. in Shelby Park w. release of
monarchs and watch their departure into Mexico. (Public event, attended by
community youth.)

3. Merienda (sweet snack, high tea) to collate data and report on findings, share
experiences and suggest further outings.

Please sign up as early as you can. If it looks like there are sufficient individuals and you'd like for me to make arrangements with the Weyrich Pecan Farm B&B for a block of rooms, let me know. The Pecan Farm is one of the sites we'll be visiting to view monarch roosts. It's an amazing place to spend the night!

To register:

Name: ______________________________

Phone/s:_____________________________

Number in party (kids welcome):_______Adults____Youths

Fee: It's free except for the canoe trip. (We have to pay the cost of hauling the canoes to the river and taking them out.)

Reply to: skoshi_98@yahoo.com

Monarch Month: October

Monarch tagging event 10-18-08 / Shelby Park 10 am
Girl Scout lecture and tagging 10-20-08 Girl Scout Building 5:30pm

Monarchs Weather Contrary Wind

October has long been Monarch Month in Eagle Pass, but there's no predicting exactly when the migration of this remarkable butterfly will actually arrive, or for that matter, whether it will be a big splash, a definite wave, or just a little trickle.

Much of that depends on complex factors 1) involving population size of the spring monarchs arriving in Southwest Texas and looking for tender milkweed on which to lay eggs, 2) the successful breeding in summer months in the Corn Belt, 3) and of course the wind patterns in the fall across West and Southwest Texas.

Migration numbers this fall are expected to be small.

Last fall the migration reached southern Oklahoma and got hung up by the millions by a big blow in early October, that actually blew the Central Flyway monarchs over to Louisiana and Mississippi. When they reached South Texas, they then had to head around the Gulf, adding about 1000 miles to the distance they would have to travel to reach the Transvolcanicos Mountains in Central Mexico. They just didn't make it.

Either they exhausted themselves or used up too much time and lost the migratory impulse or, thinking optimistically, perhaps they over-wintered around Ciudad Victoria or found their way to the slopes of Popocatepetl.

On a good day, a monarch can fly between 25 and 55 miles. Add a 1000 miles to their journey and they could exhaust their stores of fat. Monarchs tagged after October 28 in Eagle Pass have never been recovered in the Preserves of Central Mexico. They get trapped by the warmer climes and after that date lose their migratory impulse.

This fall's migration was reported in good numbers in southern Oklahoma again. Fort Worth and North East Texas reported monarchs passing in the 100s per hour.

A few early monarchs were spotted in Abilene on the 8th. La Pryor had several 100 last week. On the 8th, 9th, and 10th, I observed just a handful coming into the trees at the Radar Base. This Saturday, the Nature Center participated in birding on the Cunningham Ranch in Quemado Valley. Under the trees we observed several 100s of monarchs sheltering from the wind.

Somewhere in the next five days we should have a change in the wind. IF a front comes through from the North, then we can expect to see our normal flow of many thousands per night.

But now the picture is further complicated by the arrival of a hurricane off the Pacific bringing more rain and wind into Northern Mexico. Strong winds from the Southwest could again blow the migration away from Maverick County for yet another year.

The Nature Center is asking the public to call and report clusters of monarchs in their trees. The best times for observation are between 4 p.m. and 7 p.m. If you would call and leave your name and number and location, this will greatly help the documentation of known cluster sites in Maverick County. The number is 773-1836.

Learning our local butterflies is quite a challenge! One complication for individuals just learning to identify monarchs is the fact that the rains in July and August produced a large population of Queens, a cousin to the monarch with similar markings and colors. The Queen migration began the second week in September and continued for several weeks, leading some to think the monarchs had arrived early.

This has also been a good season for the American Snout, a much smaller orange and brown butterfly, that unfortunately, gets wrongly identified by many as "Baby Monarchs!"

This Saturday, October 18th, at 10 a.m. the Nature Center will hold a Tagging Demonstration for the public at Shelby Park (boat ramp area.) Cub Scout Troops, Girl Scouts, classroom groups and families are all invited to bring their children and help us place a tiny ID tag on each butterfly, then release it to fly on to Mexico. Come help increase our knowledge and understanding of this amazing phenomenon!

We're hoping the wind will shift and that a few million more monarchs will find their way to Maverick County —despite the contrary winds!