Monarchs in Mexico

It’s too easy to forget that verdancy is not the result of careful management,
but of life’s inexorable course, present wherever we don’t suffocate it.
- The Eye of the Sandpiper by Brandon Keim

This is from back in January, on our last pre-Covid trip to Mexico. I took a ton of photographs and video of the monarchs so I left processing them till I got home. Of course, then I never got around to posting them. As Saskatchewan winter sets in, with travel limited, it seems like a good time to think about monarchs flying in the sunshine.

For a long time I've wanted to see the monarch butterflies overwintering in Mexico in huge numbers. Seeing the IMAX film Flight of the Butterflies just made we want to see them in person. We get the occasional monarch in Saskatoon, but not in large quantities like this. Once upon a time abundance in nature was common. Human abundance has put an end to most of that - bison, carrier pigeons, sharks. It made it special to see one of the few remaining concentrations.

We were using Google Maps to navigate in our rental car in Mexico, but Google didn't seem to quite know where the monarch reserves were. We were aiming for El Rosario, but following butterfly signs we ended up at Sierra Chincua Reserve.

As soon as we arrived I was unhappy to see the huge parking lot, the souvenir shops, food booths, and signs for the zip line. I could tell this was not going to be the wonderful experience of nature that I had imagined. And it didn't help that it was the weekend. We walked up the trail with hordes of tourists, the final section shuffling single file. When we finally reached the end I didn't see anything. There were no butterflies flying around. None near the trail. It was a cold cloudy day and the butterflies weren't flying, they were all roosting in the trees, a long way from the trail. There were a lot of monarchs, but not much to see of them. I tried to take some photos but it wasn't what I had hoped for. We were constrained to a narrow path by ropes and guards. Soon the pressure from the line of people drove us away from the butterflies.

We had deliberately allowed two days to visit the butterflies, but we had no desire to go back to the same spot. We decided to continue on to Zitacuaro. If we got up the motivation to try again, there was another sanctuary near there that seemed a bit more off the beaten path. The weather was nice and sunny the next day so we headed for the El Capulin Sanctuary. We pulled into a small parking lot with no other cars. That was positive, but were they even open? It turned out they were. This time we were given a guide. He didn't speak any English, but at least he showed us where to go. They wanted us to ride horses but we said no. It did turn out to be a long hike with quite a bit of uphill, but we were happy to be out hiking in the mountains on a beautiful day. And it's easier to take photographs on foot.

Partway up we started to see the odd monarch. Not knowing if we'd see more, I started photographing them. At least they were out flying around, unlike the day before! As we climbed further, more and more appeared. Soon there was a steady stream of them flowing down the mountain. It's hard to describe the feeling of being surrounded by a seemingly endless stream of butterflies. Up higher the forest was full of them. There were a few bunches roosting, but most of them seemed to be out flying. For me, this was definitely a highlight of nature viewing. I took photos of them in the air, carpeting the ground, covering the bushes, of individuals.

I don't usually take much video but photographs just didn't do this spectacle justice. (best viewed on something bigger than a phone)

Monarchs are amazing creatures. It was actually a Canadian, Fred Urquhart, who discovered the secret of their overwintering in Mexico. Up to 500,000 monarchs migrate from Canada and the US east of the divide to a few overwintering sites in central Mexico - up to 7500 km. (Western monarchs don't fly as far - they overwinter at sites in California and Baja.) It's hard to imagine a fragile butterfly traveling all that way.

How they navigate, and how they know where to go is still an open question. They are thought to have a time-compensated sun compass. In other words they have an internal clock that lets them tell direction by the position of the sun. They may also have a magnetic compass.

While individual butterflies migrate the whole way south, the northward migration takes multiple generations. Butterflies leaving Mexico only make it as far as Texas and Oklahoma, where they find milkweed to lay their eggs on for the next generation. It may take up to four generations to reach Canada.

See also:
all 26 photos in this album
Shelley's monarch blog post
other posts from this trip

Colima Ecopark Zoo

We noticed that there was an Ecopark in Colima. "ecopark" can mean various things, but this one appeared to be a zoo. We stopped there before paragliding one morning. (Morning is cooler and tends to be less crowded.) It turned out to be quite a good zoo.

I have mixed feelings about zoos, obviously captivity is not ideal. But they do exist, and I love to see and photograph the animals. You can only hope they inspire people to help protect nature.



Some of the cages were small and bare, but other enclosures were large with lots of vegetation. Although it is amazing to see them, I feel worst for animals like the big cats.







Some of the animals, like this capybara, seemed to be roaming the grounds freely.



One of the advantages of zoos is that you get to observe animals much more closely than you would in the wild. I love the details like the foot of an ostrich.



Or a Crowned Crane:



Or the patterns of the feathers of a bird:



I also like to take "portraits" of animals:













The bird above was inside the walk-in aviary and it took a liking to Shelley. It followed her around, hopping along the railing and flying to land right beside her. It didn't actually touch her, but she was a little nervous to be stalked by a large bird (about the size of a Canada Goose).

The lemurs, iguanas, and monkeys had their own island.







See all 50 photos in this batch

Paragliding at Colima, Mexico

After diving at Manzanillo we headed inland to Colima where there was another paragliding site. The day we arrived we managed to find the landing zone near Piscila (recognizable by the wind sock). It was a nice big open field next to the road. After Malinche (Tenincingo) I was a little nervous that the landing zone was quite far from launch. But there were some alternate fields where you could land. We tried to drive up to launch, but the road was blocked with traffic cones. We saw some people hiking up though.

It was a bit cloudy the first day I flew. That would slow down the thermals which is usually a bad thing, but I was happy enough to have mellow conditions for my first flight. We arrived early enough that we would have time to hike up but the road was open so we got up to launch quite early. It's an impressive launch - large and covered in artificial turf. You'd almost think you were in Europe.

As expected, the wind was over the back when we first arrived, but around 11am it started swinging around to the right direction. We expected other paraglider pilots to be flying since it's a popular site and it was the weekend. Finally, about 11:30 a truck load of pilots showed up. Several of them made a point of coming to talk to us and giving us an introduction to the site. They obviously had the timing figured out because pretty much as soon as they arrived, they launched.

It was nice to see where they went and where they got lift. Once they were all launched I followed. No one was getting very high, but there were enough light thermals to stay up and get a bit above launch. Often we (paraglider pilots) use clouds to find thermals (the rising moist air often turns into a cloud). But here, because it's dry, the skies are often clear with no clouds to mark the thermals. Instead, the trick is to look for the vultures (turkey and black). They prefer not to exert themselves any more than necessary, so they also look for thermals, and are often better at finding them. At one point I was circling in a thermal along with a vulture. As well as helping me stay in the lift, it also helped me see the turbulence. When I saw it's wings getting rocked from side to side I knew I'd be hitting the same rough air in a few seconds.

I was thermaling with one of the local pilots and when the thermal ran out, he headed out front. I figured he probably knew better than me, so I followed. Unfortunately, we didn't find any lift. The other pilot managed to circle back and presumably stayed up, but I was low enough that I figured I'd better head for the LZ. I could see another pilot packing up in the field before the LZ. Presumably they hadn't quite made it. But I had plenty of height to reach the main field and make a good landing.

I could see people in the shade under a tree in the corner of the field by the road. I kited my wing the rest of the way across the field towards what I assumed were other pilots. It turned out to be a couple of local kids who didn't seem all that impressed with my kiting skills :-)

The next day was even busier with other pilots, and a couple of tandem flights. Although it was clearer, conditions were light and everyone was waiting. Finally, around 1pm everyone got in the air.



There was an alternate landing area that you could reach if you got high enough and that was my goal for the day. From what other pilots had told me, I figured I needed at least 300m (1000ft) of height over launch. I found various thermals, and at one point I got 270m up. I considered going for it, but decided to stick to my cutoff. Shortly after I found a stronger thermal and was 300m up and still rising. At about 400m up I didn't track the thermal quite right and hit the turbulence at the edge of it. Since it was a fairly strong thermal, it bounced me around a bit and I chickened out and left it. (Generally you want to stick with thermals as high as you can get.) With 400m I figured I had lots of height to get to the other LZ. The first part crossed the river and a bunch of forested area where it wouldn't be pleasant to land. There should have been more thermals on the way across, but I didn't find anything. It soon became obvious I wasn't going to make the LZ but there were other fields I could land in. When I got closer, I saw another pilot had landed in one of the fields so I headed there. Another pilot was also approaching the same field. Obviously I wasn't the only one to not find lift. Despite not quite reaching my goal, it was fun to do a tiny bit of cross country.

The next day we decided to hike up to get some exercise. It took about 45 minutes and was a nice hike except that it was already very hot. (Temperatures were over 30c during the day.)

hiking up the cobblestone road with my paraglider

It was Monday so we weren't sure if there would be any local pilots or not. It was windier and I was afraid it might get too windy to fly if I waited too long, so I launched on my own. The thermals weren't as good (probably because it was earlier, and the wind tends to disrupt them). So I ended up with a sled ride to the Piscila LZ. As I was packing up I saw four more paragliders launch. While they didn't have incredible flights, they stayed up a lot longer than I did. Maybe I should have waited a bit longer. Of course, it might have been a question of skill rather than conditions.

checking the wind speed

Tuesday morning we went to the zoo first and then drove up to launch. When I first got out of the car I thought it was less windy but when we got out in the open on launch I realized it was even windier than the day before. Judging wind speed is hard, especially gusts versus lulls so I got out my wind meter. The average was ok but the gusts were hitting 32 km/hr. That's about the speed of my wing so if it picked up much I'd go backwards (not what you want). We hung around for a while to see if any other pilots showed up. No one did. I checked the wind again, thinking maybe it had slowed down. No, the gusts were now 37 km/hr. We headed down.

Photos thanks to Shelley

Scuba Diving in Mexico

We wanted to get in some scuba diving while we were in Mexico. We took our own gear with us because rental gear isn't always the best (which is a safety issue). Although the better diving is probably on the Caribbean side, we didn't want to drive that far so we stuck to the Pacific side. One of our favorite dive areas is the Sea of Cortez near Baja Mexico and we hoped there would be some similarities.

The first place we tried was Zihuatenejo. Although the young staff at the Zihuatenejo Dive Center were friendly and helpful, I was a little concerned when the dive master didn't know what a nudibranch was. Maybe it was just a language issue since he was from Germany. I didn't take my underwater camera the first day since I wanted to keep things simpler for the first dives. Unfortunately, that was the day we did shallow dives with little current, which would have been good for photography. Whereas the second day, when I did take my camera, the dives were deep with enough current to make holding still to take photographs almost impossible. Both days the visibility was quite bad, the worst we've encountered for quite a while. On the positive side, there was a lot more hard coral reef than I was expecting. There isn't much around Baja, and most of the reefs are on the Caribbean side. We did see a large seahorse on the first day. We've only ever seen tiny ones before so that was nice. It would have been nice to have my camera, although it wasn't in a very good spot to photograph. It was reddish and 4 or 5 inches long. I assume it was a Giant (or Pacific) Seahorse. We also saw a sea turtle, but with the low visibility it disappeared rapidly. We also saw a nice school of what they called "sardines".



Unfortunately, with the worst possible timing, I caught a cold right when we started diving. The second day of diving I knew I was coming down with something but I thought I could manage. Although I did ok with equalizing on the first dive, the second one gave me a massive sinus headache. After that I gave up on diving till my cold was over. Shelley went out again a third day without me. We had originally planned for four days of diving, but there weren't that many dive sites and the visibility was bad so we decided to move on.

A few days later in Manzanillo we hooked up with Octopus Garden Dive Center. We had chosen a hotel right close to the dive center (Hotelito Escondido - recommended). Although this area wasn't "downtown", it was right on the beach and had a good assortment of restaurants.

We saw five different kinds of eels, including a couple we hadn't seen before:









We only saw a few nudibranchs which I think were all Red-tipped Sea Goddesses. I only managed a decent photo of one. (It's less colorful than the one I photographed in Belize)



There were lots of stingrays around. I think most of them were Bullseye Round Stingrays like this one.



We also saw this Southern Banded Guitarfish. Guitarfish are sort of a cross between a stingray and a shark. I like the bright yellow spots.



Usually we only see one or two Moorish Idols at a time, so it was interesting to see this larger group. You can get an idea of the visibility from the background. There was a lot of swell at this point so I shot a bunch as I got pushed around and managed to get this one half decent shot.



Porcupinefish have such big eyes with interesting flecks in them. This one seemed curious about me.



I thought this was a different kind of boxfish, but it's just the male colors of the Spotted Boxfish. The females are just black with white spots. (And they can change sex and therefore coloring.)



Guineafowl Puffers also have two distinct colorings, either a similar black with white spots, or a golden phase (not connected to male/female in this case).



Scorpionfish are generally well camouflaged, but this one was almost impossible to see. I spotted one fin and figured out what it must be, but it was still almost impossible to actually see the fish.



We only saw a single fairly small lobster. I'm not sure if they are naturally uncommon here, or whether most of them have been caught.



I didn't see any Christmas Tree Worms, but there were lots of Feather Duster Worms of various colors.





The "tubes" you can see in the photo above were probably made by feather duster worms.

Given the poor visibility and the limited dive operations, we probably wouldn't bother diving in this area again. But we were still glad to have got out, and despite the conditions we saw quite a bit of stuff.

See also Shelley's post on our diving

See all 33 photos in this batch

Tortugario Ecologico

When we were navigating to Manzanillo, I noticed I had marked a location on Google Maps - Tortugario Ecologico, just south of Manzanillo. We had time, so we decided to stop and see what it was. It appears to be a combination of public displays, conservation, and research. The main subjects are sea turtles, american crocodiles, and green iguanas, as well as the lagoon and mangroves themselves.



Some of the turtles appeared injured. Possibly all of them were rescued? They might have been raising some of the juveniles to a larger size to have a better chance of surviving after release.



It's nice to be able to look at them close up. When we see turtles scuba diving, they're generally disappearing into the distance. Or at the least swimming around.



We only saw one juvenile crocodile. I love the eyes!



Humorously, a lizard (whiptail?) ran by the baby crocodile while I was taking photos.



There were also a couple of adult crocodiles. I get a kick out of their crooked teeth, and their lumpy skin. That juvenile has some growing to do!



There were some captive adult iguanas. Apparently they catch the females when they are likely to be carrying eggs. Then they can recover the eggs after they are laid, and raise the baby iguanas to a bigger size before releasing them. The helps their survival rate since the young are the most vulnerable.



After wandering the exhibits, we found a boardwalk through the mangroves. Shelley managed to spot a wild juvenile iguana (maybe one of the ones they released?). They are such a bright green they don't seem very well camouflaged against the dead brown leaves. Presumably they would blend in better in the foliage.



The center isn't anything fancy, but if you're in the area and you enjoy this kind of thing, I'd recommend it.

See all 18 photos in this batch