Notes From Junior Naturalists Event On Sept 21st

Thanks to everyone who made it out to the TFN Juniors Butterfly and Hawk event at Rosetta McClain yesterday. We were blessed with perfect weather for enjoying the still very beautiful garden.

In our opening activities, we had a chance to handle three types of hawk wings, and learn how Ontario butterflies, other than Monarchs over-winter. Betty McCulloch showed us the sexing, weighing, assessing, and tagging that they do throughout the season at Rosetta McClain. She told us Monarchs fly up to two kilometers high and roughly 100 kilometers a day. That’s why they are fueling up in Rosetta McClain Gardens! It takes them about 30 days of flying to make it to Mexico. Margaret McRae explained how the Monarchs leaving Ontario fly straight to Mexico, but it takes three generations for the return trip. We tagged and released a butterfly Margaret had raised. She also brought a Swallowtail pupa for us to examine. Hugh taught us about the Hawk migration, and we studied bird bones to learn about the adaptations of a bird’s body for flight. Vanessa and Monica led us in a game of Predator-Prey. In our rambling about the gardens before closing some did an Ontario wildflower treasure hunt, others sketched. We found two kinds of Woolly Bears. Hummingbirds were zipping about!!

Further Investigation:

Toronto Field Naturalists wishes to acknowledge this Land through which we walk. For thousands of years, the Land has been shared by the Wendat, the Haudenosaunee, and the Anishinaabe. Toronto is situated on the Land within the Toronto Purchase, Treaty 13, the traditional and treaty Lands of the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation. This territory is also part of the Dish with One Spoon Wampum, a covenant agreement between Anishinaabeg, Haudenosaunee, Wendat peoples and allied nations to peaceably share the land and all its resources. Today, the Land is home to peoples of numerous nations. We are all grateful to have the opportunity to continue to care for and share the beauty of this Land.