Milking It for Monarchs

Imagine having to choose just one food to live off for half of your life. While I'm certain fried walleye

would be a good option, or pizza would work, or even wild rice brats fresh off the grill could sustain

about anyone, the hedging exhibited just in this sentence alone shows how difficult it would be. Now

imagine you're a monarch butterfly, and you don't have a choice. From birth through its caterpillar

phase, the iconic butterfly depends on one food source for all its needs to reach its most noted black-

and-orange adult appearance – milkweed.

The decline in monarch butterflies has been well noted in recent years, as over the past two decades,

populations throughout North America have plummeted precipitously. As tracked by the World Wildlife

Federation, in 1996 more than one billion estimated monarch butterflies overwintered in dense clusters

on more than 44 acres of their historic migratory destinations in the oyamel fir forests of the limited

mountainous regions in central Mexico, about 60 miles from the nation's capital of Mexico City. By

2017, those populations dwindled to around 150 million butterflies occupying a mere 6.12 acres of their

historical wintering sites in the region. An all-time low in the organization's tracking of the migration

from northern latitudes was observed in 2013, with just 1.66 of the roughly 138,000 available acres

visited by the monarchs arriving from the Northern U.S. and Southern Canada typically located east of

the Rockies in a journey that begins in August each year and ends in late October.

While many factors play into the decreasing number of overwintering monarchs in Mexico, which in turn

serve as an indicator of the overall population of the insect, one of the biggest is the disappearance of

milkweed stands which once were abundant on the prairies, plains and other areas of North America

which fostered the recruitment of the continent's most notable butterfly species. There are 73 types of

milkweed found in North America, of which 30 or so are utilized by monarch caterpillars in their early

stages of life for growth and development before they form their cocoons and turn into adults. But with

the development of land and the widespread usage of herbicides such as glyphosate which have

immediate and often-wide spreading effects on areas not part of crop fields, including nearby milkweed

stands, these areas which served as the butterflies' rearing grounds have decreased in recent years.

Through the efforts of conservation groups, gardening clubs, and even fans of backyard butterflies,

however, the tide of missing milkweed plants may be turning to the benefit of monarchs and other

pollinators who rely on the flowers for food. Whether part of a program for planting conservation

areas, or simply a packet of the puffball-driven seeds handed out to gardeners and flower-tenders,

efforts to reestablish milkweed on the landscape in rural, suburban and urban areas are growing and

with them, hope for monarch butterfly populations rebounding in the near future.

While the expectation is to increase the options available to these insects, which make one of nature's

most incredible and arduous journeys to continue their populations, more work must be done to ensure

the expansion of rearing places for their young when they return to the upper Midwest and surrounding

areas each spring and summer to continue the cycle. Through the efforts of local conservation groups

creating seed packets and national organization like the Xerces Society (xerces.org) assisting in the

creation of places for pollinators of all kinds, monarchs and many other species vital to the production of

food, flowers and a vibrant ecological web will continue to rebound. With the addition of milkweed to

any planting, monarchs will have a place to start their annual cycle in the upper Midwest and in all

regions they inhabit.