Plan To Save Monarch Butterflies

butterfly7
butterfly7

Wildlife officials say the “king” of butterflies could meet the same fate as the passenger pigeon unless people step in to plant more of the monarch caterpillars’ only food source — milkweed. The monarch butterfly population has crashed, according to Naomi Edelson with the National Wildlife Federation, and can only be revived with a conservation strategy that improves its habitat by increasing its food supply.

“I know people can see hundreds of them come through their own backyards, and they’re at such a low level that if there are some very big severe storms during the winter in their wintering grounds in Mexico, we could lose them completely.”

Edelson tells us the eastern monarch population, which is found east of the Rocky Mountains, including in Michigan, has declined 90% in recent decades. She believes we’ll miss them when they’re gone.