Ken, I have my usual amount of Monarchs and Swallowtails. Have been seeing them since early June along with more than the usual amount of Great Spangeled Fritillery. Also seeing more than the usual #'s of the bee types of pollinators. The Pennsylvania Leatherwings are all over anything with flowers scarfing up pollen and small bad bugs. And best of all the japanese beetles are fewer than I have seen, ever. But then I haven't looked yet today.

Thanks gazania! I guess something is up in my garden then. :c( I should have had them since June too. I wonder what it could be. I am going to visit a farm that is just 2 blocks away to see if they have seen a decline.

I have seen quite a few Japanese Beetles in the last few weeks, but not as many as I remember.

Ken

I'm wondering if our cool Spring delayed the Butterfly hatch here in MI. I haven't seen too many yet either. The Japs just arrived in my Garden, but aren't too bad yet...

I haven't had what you'd call a good butterfly year for some time now. They're especially absent this year. It's something I normally notice, as we are birders and also plant vegetation to attract butterflies. I have greenhouses and for many years used to have to kick off the large ventilators frequently during the day to allow the butterflies to escape its pull and get away.

Not so this year. I've had years where I've seen forty or fifty different species in one day. I can count on my hands how many butterflies I've seen since winter. One fritillary, one zebra swallowtail, couple of pipevine swallowtail and some larvae, a painted lady and some cabbage loopers. That's about it. However, I live in farm country and I suspect for miles around us we might have BT corn.

Ken, it's been slow in my garden as well, in New Milford. I had seen just a few yellow and black swallowtails in the past weeks, but not many. I did have a black swallowtail leave me a bunch of eggs that hatched on a parsley plant back in June. By the time I went to collect them, only ONE was left. I grabbed it up and put it in my cage, and eventually released a beautiful female in mid June, I believe. I then had 8 more cats on my fennel, so to the cage those went, and pupated. They're just starting to eclose now, but I'm having pretty bad luck with them not forming properly, but that's another story. Back to the butterflies. Last week I finally had 3 monarchs fluttering around, and one female has been hanging around. She's always patrolling the garden and stopping by to check either myself or my 7yo out. It's definitely strange behavior, but I'll take it! I also had a yellow swallowtail hanging around for a few days, and some skippers finally showed up yesterday too.
The bumblebee population finally increased as well and I've seen more honeybees than ever. My coneflowers have never seen so much action, LOL. Now that the butterflies are finally showing up, I want to know what happened to my hummers!!!!!!!! I've only seen 2 this year, a male & a female, and normally I see one at least once a day. Now I'm lucky if I see one a week :(

Thanks Tracy, calliope and tasymo.

Looks like gazania is the only lucky one that posted here. :c( I hope it is a temporary thing.