Wow; stunning pics Garnet. I can only hope to have a milkweed that's beautifully decorated as yours is ;)

Nice pics! What type of milkweed are you using? Those are some nice, big leaves.

You have one really great setup for rearing them!

When you bury water bottles do you just put large stems of milkweed in bottles?

That along with putting homemade cage over entire setup seems to be great way to rear a number of them even when not on vacation.

If one has as many in different stages as you've got you'd have to make a few cages to separate them as you already have.

I'm not flush with Monarch cats so don't think I'd need as many cages.

I found one yesterday and brought it inside but saw another today on same plant. Was running around all day so didn't bring it in but your setup could work for raising more cats of like stages in outdoor setting.

This sparked my interest because I had to stay at my father's to raise a few BSTs since that's where the butterfly garden is. Cleaning couple times a day, feeding and sheltering from direct sun/rain kept me tied down but a setup like yours would allow me to raise them and get home more often like a "normal" person...all relative, of course!

Thanks for what I think is great alternative rearing arrangement.

Don't think my milkweed is as healthy as yours. I've got 3 incarnata milkweed and bottom leaves keep yellowing and falling off. 3 Tuberosa milkweed are new and kind of small but would do in a pinch if I run out of incarnata which is where I found 2 cats so far. I've fed and keep watered the incarnata but leaves still yellow and drop.

First year growing anything as well as trying to rear these little guys so not very astute about identifying and correcting plant problems.

I am raising all of mine outdoors this year. I wanted to see if I had less trouble with disease than I did last year, and I haven't had one single BST with the dreaded black death this year. So, changing temps from outdoors to indoors could have an affect on the cats.

Garnet, your photos and your cats are gorgeous! You really have it down! It looks like the milkweed you are using is Asclepias syriaca, or Common Milkweed. I have some, too. It started out doing really well, but is looking kind of ragged right now. We've had about 11 days of 100+ temps so nothing looks really good right now.

I have seen few if any Monarchs, though. We usually see more when they trek back to Mexico.

Susan

Thanks everyone.

Yes, the milkweed is common milkweed. I never planted it, it just grew. As it is considered a "noxious weed" in my area you don't normally see them in well tended gardens. My mother bugs me every year to pull it. It is rather tall so in order to fit it into the cage I just cut it in half and insert into the buried water bottles or large yogurt container with an X cut in the top. I do change the water often. When I had BSTs last year I put potted dill and fennel in the cage which I kept half buried in the herb garden until I needed it. Worked great.

Last year I kept everything outside. This year, I keep eggs and cats indoors - the cats in different stages in separate containers until about the 3rd instar and then they go out. Once they've pupated they come back in. I hot glued six today. My system works well for me being a working mother of three.

The backyard has become and even bigger attraction to my kids' friends since the whole operation started but it remains a totally hands-off attraction - until the release of course.