Text by Paula Dittrick, TMNCPC blogmaster, based on March 3 news release from Texas Master Naturalist listserve. Photo by TMNCPC member John Donaho from Coastal Prairie Chapter web site archives.
Texas Master Naturalists are trained to watch nature and make connections. Fittingly, an iNaturalist project studies the link between development of flowering plants after the February freeze and its influence on the 2021 Texas monarch population.
Texas Nature Trackers, working with Monarch Watch at the University of Kansas, created the iNat project. Observations will be gathered until March 31. Researchers will compare iNat observations about the plant and pollinator survey with statistics from Tempest weather stations.
Monarchs coming from Mexico generally reach milkweed-rich areas of Texas around the middle of March.
Dr. Chip Taylor, director of Monarch Watch, questions whether monarchs arriving in Texas will encounter milkweeds and nectar plants in sufficient abundance.
“Or will they encounter a landscape still too deep in recovery to provide the needed resources to establish the next monarch generation,” Taylor asks.
People in Texas are asked to upload to iNat their photos of the first shoots and buds of milkweeds and the first flowers of nectar plants throughout March, along with a link to the nearest Tempest station, so that researchers can compare the timing of milkweeds this year with previous years.
Tempest weather stations
Citizen scientists are asked to locate a Tempest weather station within a 10-mile radius–if there is one–for each observation. The following link will take you to a map of Tempest locations in the US – https://tempestwx.com/map/30.6122/-95.6428/8 .
Simply zoom in and out on this map to find your location. Click on the icon for the closest station. Then, append the name for that station to your observations.