Nature Pics

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Happy New Year from Año Nuevo State Park




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[Frelga]

Very cool place! Are the seals not there this time of year?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

They are, but only if you only see them if you do the tour.

[Frelga]

This is what it looked like in the fall when the males hung out on the beach and occasionally sparred to keep in training

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[narya]

And Happy New Year from Henry Cowell Redwood State Park. I'll have more photos when I get them resized.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

My very old friends .

[narya]

OK, here are a few pictures I took today from Henry Cowell Redwood State Park and Natural Bridges State Beach. The latter has a Monarch butterfly sanctuary.

[narya]

More friends....

[narya]

And the forest at dusk, and sea wrack (washed up seaweed).

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Good morning!


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[RoseMorninStar]

Once, back in the '70's I saw a monarch cluster hatch like that. It's pretty darn amazing. Back then we didn't carry cameras with us everywhere, and even so we may not have had film on hand so I have no photos, but amazing none-the-less.

Love the tree photos. It's hard to capture their majesty but you both took some lovely photos.

[Frelga]

I've been to the sanctuary, and it is an amazing site. But even here I can't walk around the block without being smacked in the face by one of those butterflies.

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[RoseMorninStar]

It's nice to see the monarchs somewhere. They are becoming rare here and that is a shame.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

We went a couple of years ago and the monarchs were almost completely gone. They were back in force when we went last year, and by all accounts (and certainly as shown by narya's photos) they are even more abundant this year, not only at Natural Bridges but also at Lighthouse Field (a couple of miles up the coast), where they had not previously been so prevalent.

[narya]

Monarchs are pretty amazing. In February or March, the butterflies I just photographed will fly from coastal California to inland California sites, and find milkweed to lay eggs on. These eggs will hatch caterpillars, Generation 1, which will eat prodigiously, pupate into butterflies, then start to migrate north, living on nectar, and following the springtime. Their offspring, Gen 2, will continue the migration, following the warm weather, milkweed, and other flowers north, and Gen 3 will do the same. By late summer of this year, Gen 3 will make it to Washington State, and lay eggs. This fall, Gen 4 will hatch in Washington State, eat the last of the summer's milkweed, pupate into butterflies, and fly all the way south to coastal California by November, chasing the tail end of the warm weather and flowers as they head south. Gen 4 will stay in various protected frost-free location with winter-flowering plants, until next spring, then to start the 4-generation-in-one-year migration over again. The Monarchs east of the Rockies have a different migration path, overwintering in Mexico. They don't actually hibernate, they just cluster together at night, then when the temperature goes above 50*F, they scatter to forage for nectar. The bright orange ones in my pictures were the ones who were stretching and getting ready to fly off, as the temperature was just creeping up above 50*F.

[RoseMorninStar]

One of the issues is that even organic farms can and do use Bt (Bacillus Thuringiensis) which kill larva/caterpillars on crops. This often oversprays into ditch areas where milkweed grows killing much of the monarch larva/caterpillars. Monarchs used to be plentiful here in summer & fall but it's rare to see them now.

When our daughter was little every fall we would take one in & feed it, it would turn into a chrysalis then we'd wait about 10 days & watch it hatch.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

My favorite picture of Tol Eressëa (actually the Monterey peninsula across the Monterey Bay from Santa Cruz).

[RoseMorninStar]

Lovely colors of the lonely isle over sea.

We're having a blizzard today. We had 6" of new snow a few days ago and toady we're getting another 7-12" with high winds. We'll see how it is by the end of the day. Can you spot the squirrels under the bird feeder?

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[Inanna]

Oh wonderful. I want a good solid snowfall!! So badly.

[RoseMorninStar]

Oh really? Be careful what you wish for...