Monarchs Ready to Take Flight!

 

Volunteers helping in the tagging
process before monarchs start to migrate.

The Butterfly House, a summer fan favorite here at Beaver Creek Reserve, has now come to a close, which means the Monarchs are getting ready to make the long journey south. Each year at the start of migration our naturalist staff and volunteers help tag monarchs. 

Between two tagging periods on August 29 and September 4, 200 monarchs were tagged. Any monarchs still hanging around from the butterfly house will be tagged and released. If you're still seeing monarchs in the area they are moving south from farther north to stop and rest.

Naturalist, Jim Schwiebert, on
top of the butterfly house gazebo
to reach butterflies for tagging. 

In our last post, we discussed, Raising Monarch that Migrate. Tagging is another way that we can track and protect the monarch population, with limited human interference.   “It [tagging] provides insight into the habitats they use for reproduction, and allows researchers to associate the location of original capture with the point of recovery for each butterfly,” said BCR Naturalist, Jim Schwiebert. Data collected from the tagged butterflies provides information on migration patterns of returning butterflies, how weather influences these patterns and survival rates each year. The data collected at Beaver Creek is part of a larger effort to conduct research on this population.

A Painted Lady resting on
naturalist, Jim Schwiebert’s, shoulder.

The Great Lakes population of monarchs have been tracked at 12 sites in Mexico, to date. They can travel to these southern sites in as little as a few miles a day or as many as 40 to 50 miles per day. Research shows from past tagging, that travel time is highly dependent on weather conditions. Wind, rain, and cooler weather can stall their migration for days at a time. 

Monarch with a tagged wing so
     BCR can track its migration to Mexico.

The majority of migrating Monarchs reach their overwintering site in Mexico by the end of November. Tag returns indicate that the Monarchs we tag, reside in the mountains west of Mexico City.  “The monarchs roost in stands of Oyamel Fir trees, and that is where they spend the winter, only leaving their roosts to visit a mountain stream to rehydrate on warmer days,” commented Jim Schwiebert.

After the warm winter they spend in Mexico, while the rest of us freeze in the Midwest, they start their journey northward in March. The generation of Monarchs that migrated will mate and lay eggs in southern states, until the end of their lives. The migrated Monarchs progeny will then move towards the Great Lakes region and will produce another generation. This third generation are the Monarchs seen in June and July, in time for another summer of Butterfly House fun here at Beaver Creak Reserve!