Monarch Decline

Did you know that one in every three bites of food you take required a pollinator visit? Pollination is essential for many of our favorite foods—from almonds to vanilla, and so many fruits and vegetables in between.

The decline of pollinators around the world is threatening not only our food supply but also the function of plant communities and ecosystems.

Early June is the time of year we should begin seeing the monarch butterfly fluttering about our flowers and plants in central and western New York. But, scientists are worried that a sharp decline in the population of the iconic insect could cut back local monarch sightings dramatically, or end them all together.

When you think about it, the migration of the monarch butterfly is pretty amazing.

  In the U.S. alone, there are more than 17,000,000 acres along federal, state and county highways that can potentially…

Paul Mirocha’s elegant, precise and moving illustrations of monarchs and milkweeds have already begun to grace our website and public presentations, thanks to support recently received from the Compton Foundation.

He is considered by many to be among the most widely respected biological illustrators in North America, and his work has been featured on many…

In a landmark meeting in the history of insect conservation, the White House today convened diverse stakeholders to address catastrophic declines in pollinators and prioritize their recovery on a continent-wide scale. Led by White House Science Policy Advisor, Dr. John Holdren, more than fifty farmers, beekeepers, nurserymen, scientists, educators…

Right now in Washington and Oregon, 380,000 honeybee hives are at work pollinating cherry, pear, and apple orchards.

Last month, a million hives—three-quarters of the nation’s entire stock of commercial honeybees—were pollinating almonds in the Central Valley of California.

Stephanie Spencer considers monarch butterflies a staple of classroom learning. As a first grade teacher, she brought monarchs into her classroom to illustrate required content on life cycles.

Years later she began teaching third grade, and monarchs became the focus of her unit on migration.

Iowa is taking a big step to help the recovery of monarch butterflies. The Iowa Monarch Conservation Consortium on Feb. 27 released a statewide strategy to support monarch butterfly populations in Iowa and North America.

This insect is an important pollinator of plants and crops. The 135-page plan can help farmers, backyard gardeners and others with a road map for boosting monarch butterfly habitat.

As we dream of our summer gardens, it’s time to consider adding some milkweeds. Milkweed flowers look like something from another planet: Sputnik-like bundles of little blossoms with curved prongs in pink, orange, purple and white.

At least five milkweed species connect Flagstaff to the annual migration of monarch butterflies up and down North America. In fact the Southwest Monarch Study pinpoints Flagstaff as a “monarch hotspot.”

The City of St. Louis is launching a citywide initiative to help connect people and urban nature. The STL Milkweeds for Monarchs initiative goals are to increase monarch butterfly habitat and to help people experience the splendor of monarchs in neighborhood parks and spaces.

This initiative will advance a priority in the Mayor’s Sustainability Action Agenda: to foster an enhanced connection between people and urban natural resources.

Hoping to focus attention on the plight of the monarch butterfly at a North American summit meeting next week, a group of prominent scientists and writers urged the leaders of Mexico, the United States and Canada to commit to restoring the habitat that supports the insect’s extraordinary migration across the continent.

Calling the situation facing the butterfly “grim,” the group issued a letter that outlined a proposal to plant milkweed, the monarch caterpillar’s only food source, along its migratory route in Canada and the United States.

Mexican poet Homero Aridjis wants to build a solar barrier between his country and the United States — and have the United States pay for it by selling electricity to customers in border cities.

Aridjis, an internationally known poet, novelist and environmental leader, said he has received overwhelming support for the Mexican-built barrier, first proposed by him and James Ramey in a December article on the Huffington Post website.

It has been said that for any “movement” to succeed, a moving theme song is needed. That may be true.

Bob Dylan’s “The Times, They are a-changing” and “Blowing in the Wind”; Pete Seeger’s “We Shall Overcome” and “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” and Peter, Paul and Mary’s “If I Had a Hammer” are but a tiny sample of the soul-moving tunes that come to mind when thinking of the 1960s civil rights movement.

This last year, tens of thousands of children across the Midwest watched IMAX film Flight of the Butterflies on the…

My mantra has always been “the impact of the individual, the impact of the individual…” I have had great teachers in my life that made sure I realized that we indeed make a difference – but it’s up to us to choose if it’s a positive or negative one.

This all started with Gary Nabhan and his wonderful, heartwarming idea for Make Way for Monarchs to sponsor a “Day of Action and Contemplation”…