Monarchs

Bondsville Mill Park Monarchs

Spring Migration 2026

The Spring Migration (March - June). This figure is an interpretation of the routes taken by monarchs during the Spring migration. The pathways are based on tag recoveries and observations of migrating monarchs.

Monarch Migration Information

As winter ends and the days grow longer, the monarchs become more active, beginning to mate and often moving to locations lower on the mountainsides. They leave their Mexican roosts during the second week of March, flying north and east looking for milkweed plants on which to lay their eggs. These monarchs have already survived a long southward flight in the fall and winter's cold; they have escaped predatory birds and other hazards along the way, and are the only monarchs left that can produce a new generation. If they return too early, before the milkweed is up in the spring, they will not be able to lay their eggs and continue the cycle.
The migrating females lay eggs on the milkweed plants they find as they fly, recolonizing the southern United States before they die. Soon the first spring caterpillars hatch and metamorphose into orange and black adults. It is these newly emerged monarchs, the offspring of the butterflies that made the fall journey, that recolonize their parents' original homes. Summer monarchs live a much briefer life than the overwintering generation; their adult lifespan is only three to five weeks compared with eight or nine months for the overwintering adults. Over the summer there are three or four generations of monarch butterflies, depending on the length of the growing season. Since each female lays hundreds of eggs, the total number of monarch butterflies increases throughout the summer. Before the summer ends, there are once again millions of monarchs all over the U.S. and southern Canada.

Monarch Release Day at BMP ... 2026 ... Coming Soon

Mini Monarch Release - 2025

Monarch Release Program - 2023

Click image above to view our 2023 Monarch Release Highlights

Tagged & Ready to Fly

Images courtesy of Natalia Venkatesh from Lenzation Studio

Monarch Close-Up ...

Monarch Emerges from Chrysalis ...

The full process ..

Video & above images courtesy : Bob Felix

The Sound of a Million Monarchs ...

Monarch Release Program - 2022

Our 'Tagged' Flyers Off to Mexico

View Our Visitors Releasing BMP Monarchs From the Gardens

Click Image Above to View Our 2022 Monarch Release Highlights

The Monarch Butterfly

The Bondsville Mill Park gardens are a certified Monarch Waystation. Monarch Waystations are places that provide resources necessary for Monarchs to produce successive generations and sustain their migration. The Mill gardens with its large milkweed bed and nectar plants are the perfect place for Monarchs to lay their eggs and for the newly hatched caterpillars to find food. Without milkweeds throughout their summer breeding, Monarchs would not be able to produce the successive generations that culminate in the migration each fall. Similarly, without nectar from flowers these fall migratory Monarch butterflies would be unable to make their long journey to overwintering grounds in Mexico.

Click each image to enlarge

In addition to providing much needed plantings for Monarch butterflies, the Mill gardens, through programs and displays, involves the community in the importance of protecting and educating park visitors on why Monarch Butterflies and Pollinators are so important to our ecosystem. Park visitors get a hands-on opportunity to learn how they can be involved in citizen science and conservation as Monarch butterflies are tagged and released. From late August into early October 2020, over 400 Monarchs were released at the Mill and 200 of them were tagged. Most releases were done by children.

Monarch Release Program 2020

Monarch Release Program 2021

Monarch Release Program 2022

Monarch Release Photo Gallery - 2020

In the early planning stages for the park, native plantings were to be a very important part of the landscape and the committee wanted to have a garden that would attract butterflies. In 2017, while clearing an area for the park’s sign, Milkweed was spotted popping up and that determined the location for our butterfly garden. Much clearing had to be done before the gardens could be fully planted. Wild grape, bittersweet, and poison ivy were among the invasive plants that had to be removed. The gardens are now filled with milkweed and other native plants that attract many kinds of butterflies, moths, and other pollinators.