A Monarch sighting, my first this spring!

Seeing a Monarch butterfly this mornings was a car-stopping event!  I try to follow and get a picture of every orange butterfly I see. Earlier this week I spent about half an hour one day  trying to locate an orange butterfly I had spied along the roadside. I finally tracked it and took its picture and was disappointed that it was a Viceroy Butterfly, and not a Monarch as I had hoped.

                                                      It turned out to be a Viceroy. 

 Chasing a butterfly with a car has its difficulties, so today when I spied this orange butterfly  this morning I pulled over , keeping my eye on the location of where the butterfly was.  I got out of my car. Then as stealthily as possible I edged closer and closer on foot, taking pictures of it feeding on a clover in various stages of my approach.  Thankfully I had my 300 mm lens on my camera.... and this time I was able to get a good identifying picture!  

Yes, it was a handsome Monarch! and it was staying in one spot  feeding on the clover there as I approached it! 

In summers past I have found Monarch butterfly caterpillars and brought them home and observed their metamorphosis and then released the emerging adult butterflies. It was a wonderful amazing experience!!! I could not find any Monarch caterpillars last summer.  There are two milkweed patches that I haunt every summer. Hopefully this year will be a good year for caterpillars.  So far there have been quite a few Monarch sightings in the province  recently and predictions are that it will be a good summer for this butterfly species.
We have been trying to grow our own milkweed patch and this year we have seven plants growing, However none of our milkweed plants have ever flowered ( blossomed).  Hopefully some spring/ summer  soon they will. I don't think they will flower this year as their growth  is not comparable to the beginning of blossoms  seen in my favourite patches.  Does anyone have any information  to share on when new milkweed plants would be expected to flower?