Monarchs and swamp milkweed

An update from a previous post. There are still three (large) monarch caterpillars on our swamp milkweeds in Quebec.  Presumably the other two have pupated somewhere, unless a blue jay, unused to seeing monarch caterpillars, tried them...

Currently two are munching their way down one stem, happily leaving the flower buds to open, with one on another shoot, also eating leaves.

We’ve lost several inflorescences, but still have a few to enjoy, so we’re not complaining.

Hopefully, the adults will still have time to make it Mexico.  Our neighbors had never seen the caterpillars here before, but neither did they have neighbors who planted milkweed.  Common milkweed is throughout Quebec, although has probably become much less abunandant because of pasture and potential previous eradication efforts, if it’s like the US, (because of livestock).. 

I haven’t seen any common milkweed here, in Bas St. Laurent,, although it was abundant through Vermont on a recent visit to Shelburne Farms.