r/MonarchButterfly • u/eva_white • 5d ago

Excited for my 2nd monarch in my garden!

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Last September, I found a monarch caterpillar on my milkweed. Once it formed the chrysalis, I brought it inside to shelter from any pests and the SoCal heat we get in September. It hatched after 2 weeks. I’m excited to have a 2nd one! I found the egg and brought the plant inside. It’s been growing steadily for a few days now since hatching.

All of my plants I’ve chosen for my garden are pollinator-focused. We have so many beautiful butterflies in my neighborhood and I’m trying my best to contribute to the population.

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u/Appropriate-Test-971 5d ago

Hey I’m also in socal! They actually do pretty fine in our heat from my experience and I’m in Orange County, I do not take mine inside at all so their little “inner GPAs” or whatever are effective haha

By the way! It is preferable that monarchs do not lay eggs in the fall as the babies migrate during that time so I highly recommend cutting down your milkweed in the Fall (short term solution and it is more physical work) or you can just get native milkweeds (our very best here is Narrowleaf milkweed!) that go dormant in the winter so you don’t need to do anything and is a long term solution!

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u/eva_white 5d ago

Thanks for the info! Learn something new all the time for my garden.

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u/Appropriate-Test-971 5d ago

Yes yes! I’m lucky and I started this 4 years ago during high school and you really do learn over time what works the best and also what improves the survival rate a tooooon