> There is no such thing as "field edges" in my part of Illinois (east central).
> I can confirm that this statement holds for much of the corn belt

I routinely find milkweed and monarchs in the farm road ditches in the
Corn Belt states of ND, SD, MN, IA, NE, WI, and KS (havn't checked IL).
One often has to get out of the car and walk down into the GMO / neonic
corn and soybean crop margin ditches to observe them in July and early 
August:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dnxR9GE-R3Y
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7owV6o6xNWM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MqrvAxTl0I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GwqE1qiu6ko

In late August and early Sept. lots of newly hatched monarchs fly out
of the ditches and begin nectaring on the ditch wildflowers or the red clover
and alfalfa.  Then in the late afternoon they cluster in nearly farm 
shelter belt trees.

Lamberton, Minnesota is in the heart of GMO / neonic coated seed corn 
and soybean crop farmland of south-central Minnesota and early last September 
Univ. of Minn. employees shot this video of hundreds of monarchs gathered
in some shelter belt trees adjacent to the GMO/neonic corn and soybean crops:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32usE8vikxA 

Some of the GMO / neonic corn and soybean farmers in the upper Midwest 
are themselves posting photos of large gatherings of monarchs on their 
farm property like this southeastern South Dakota farmer did on Sept. 4, 2014: 
https://www.learner.org/cgi-bin/jnorth/jn-query-byday?1409942868 

Paul Cherubini
El Dorado, Calif.

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