I went into my backyard today, and my right eye caught a glimpse of a large butterfly. I purposefully working the plants in the ‘shed bed.’ OMG! She was . . . a Monarch. April 1, 2019 and this big Monarch female was, and here again I was incredulous, she was examining my just budding out Asclepias.

I made a very slow, very robotic approach and she fled. I  saw her. She was not birdstruck, but she had lost many scales, and her orange was very dull.

I went to examine my other garden beds, and maybe 5 minutes later I went back to the shed bed. Just then she flew back to the shed bed, and began depositing eggs on my milkweed (Asclepias).

Minutes later she left.

Happily rocked, I smiled, for I had just met a female Monarch butterfly, who had flown all the way from Mexico to my yard in Eatonton, Georgia. A heroic Monarch, who rewarded me with her eggs, in my garden of all places. The eggs of a Joan of Arc, or Margaret Thatcher, or Golda Meier, or Christie Brinkley.

If she’d waited a bit more, I was tempted to practice my waining Spanish on her. But nope, she left, on April 1, believe it or not.

Jeff