Monarch Butterfly Population Rejuvenated After Last Year’s Record Low

A group of Michigan State University researchers say there is a nexus between large-scale deaths of Monarch butterflies and the application of the widely applied herbicide glyphosate.

Their study looked at the application of glyphosate in counties in Illinois and Texas during different seasons in an effort to better understand its potential effect on the population of Monarch butterflies – which has been in sharp decline in recent years.

Partners and other stakeholders convened October 2nd and 3rd at the Monarch Joint Venture annual meeting held at the USFWS National Conservation Training Center, and what a great meeting it was! An enthusiastic group gathered to explore potential partnerships through the MJV and discuss next steps for monarch conservation.

For many, it was an opportunity to network with other monarch conservation experts and strengthen existing programs by forming new collaborations.

“This changes everything”–the line that Donald Trump stole from Naomi Klein (who referred to climate change, not emails) can only be authentically used in relation to one amazing news story this week: The front page Sunday NY Times article by Danny Hakim “Doubts About a Promised Bounty: Genetically Modified Crops Have Failed to Lift Yields and Ease Pesticide Use.”

Today, a coalition of more than 125 conservation, beekeeping, food safety, religious and farming advocacy groups rallied in front of the White House and delivered more than four million petition signatures calling on the Obama administration to put forth strong protections for bees and other pollinators.

The rally coincided with both a D.C. metro ad campaign, and Representatives Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) and John Conyers’ (D-MI) reintroduction of the Saving America’s Pollinators Act…

Monarch butterflies have experienced a breathtaking decline in the past 20 years, going from a billion strong in 1996 to roughly 30 million today because of habitat destruction. On Monday, the U.S. government announced the first federal pot of money for rescuing monarchs, with the Fish and Wildlife Service earmarking $3.2 million for the effort.

About $2 million will go toward conservation programs…

Nearly every autumn, I head to the hills to band and release hawks, eagles and other powerful raptors as they ride the mountains’ updraft on their southern migration. While there, I always used to marvel at another autumnal migrant, tiny but no less magnificent — monarch butterflies, flapping earnestly on their delicate wings, dappling the ridge top orange and black.

Although they weigh less than a tenth-of-an-ounce, the monarchs’ 2,500-mile annual transcontinental journey to Mexico is longer than that of most raptors. They fly north from Mexico across the Midwest and up the eastern seaboard, to Canada — and back again, all in one summer. The yearly trek requires several generations.

The Obama administration is hatching a plan to establish a 1,500-mile butterfly corridor along US Interstate 35 connecting Minnesota and Texas to protect the monarch butterfly.

The majestic North American monarch is well known for both its trademark orange and black stripes as well as its epic annual migration from Canada to Mexico.

  One of the joys of the season is the stunning sight of a monarch butterfly. One Long Island woman…

Sigue la ruta que la Mariposa Monarca debe recorrer, desde el norte del continente americano, para llegar a nuestro país, a sus santuarios ubicados en los bosques altos de Michoacán y el Estado de México.

La vida de la mariposa monarca comienza en una planta llamada asclepia, donde los huevecillos son depositados. La historia de la mariposa monarca continúa después de 4 a 12 días, cuando emerge una oruga que se alimenta de la misma planta en la que nació y sobre la que se desarrolla hasta convertirse en un fuerte adulto alado.

The largest habitat recovery initiative in American history is needed to plant new and enhance existing populations of milkweeds and other native wildflowers for the recovery of monarch butterflies. This report offers insights—particularly for departments of transportation and other landscape managers—on how best to build collaborations to manage the milkweed seed supply chain to recover monarchs as well as crop pollinators in North America over the next decade.

Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are not high on most physicians’ worry lists. If we think at all about biotechnology, most of us probably focus on direct threats to human health, such as prospects for converting pathogens to biologic weapons or the implications of new technologies for editing the human germline.

But while those debates simmer, the application of biotechnology to agriculture has been rapid and aggressive.

A small garden is taking root around the corner from an East Chicago ArcelorMittal plant. Its presence on the 3000 block of Michigan Avenue is to draw another type of visitor to the industrial grounds – monarch butterflies.

JobLink, which has provided classes and training to mill workers since 1980, is providing a class for ArcelorMittal employees to come in their off-time in a lot next to its office and put in some elbow grease for the garden to bloom.

More than 200 scientists, writers and artists have signed a letter addressed to Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, U.S. President Barack Obama and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in advance of the North American Leaders’ Summit in Ottawa later this month.

The signers urge that swift and energetic actions be taken to save the monarch butterfly from the threats that endanger its survival. All three countries must work together to mitigate the loss of the butterflies’ breeding habitat and to terminate all logging and mining in the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve in Michoacan, Mexico.

The Sweet Briar community was saddened to learn of the death of Lincoln Brower, a world-renowned entomologist and research professor at the College. Brower died peacefully at his home in Nelson County on Tuesday, July 17, 2018, after an extended illness.

Brower came to Sweet Briar in 1997 after retiring from the University of Florida as Distinguished Service Professor of Zoology, Emeritus, joining his wife and research collaborator,

Monarch butterflies are — quite literally — a force of nature. They strike out each year by the thousands on a four-generation, 3,000-mile-long journey of pure instinct and faith.

They use both inherent and imprinted knowledge. They use subterfuge, placing their eggs on a plant that feeds their young caterpillars, but makes them poisonous and distasteful to predators. They use natural GPS.