A monarch on the move...

When you see a monarch foraging on a flower, have you ever seen them--or photographed them--taking flight?

It's not your iconic image of  monarch, but a few twists and turns, jumble of colors and jagged lines, and the monarch takes flight.

Scenario: a male monarch nectaring on Sept. 4 on a Mexican sunflower, Tithonia rotundifola, in a Vacaville pollinator garden.

He decides it's time to depart--maybe because he's had his fill of nectar, or maybe because male longhorned bees are becoming increasingly territorial, or maybe just because....