Fewer Monarch Butterflies Are Surviving Their Migration To Mexico
Millions of monarch butterflies migrate from Canada and the United States to the forests of Mexico each year.
Fewer and fewer monarch butterflies are making the trip primarily because their natural food supply is being cut off.
It takes several generations of monarch butterflies to a make the trip which can be up to and over 3000 miles.
The butterflies breed along the way and the next generation picks up the trip where the previous generation left off.
The next generation starts off as an egg and then develops into a caterpillar. The caterpillars naturally feed on milkweed but herbicides used to protect GMO crops like soybean and corn are destroying milkweed at an alarming rate.
With the milkweed less and less monarch caterpillars survive to become monarch butterflies. Illegal logging in Mexico is also causing a problem.
The monarch butterflies migrate to their wintering grounds in Mexico and the cover the forests in Mexico and the trees in areas that the monarchs use to hibernate are being cut down at an alarming rate.
The rate of illegal logging has slowed as agencies have become actively involved in protecting the trees.
The Decline of the Monarch Butterfly
The monarch butterfly population has been on the decline for the past 15 years. Scientists determine the size of the monarch population by analyzing their coverage of their wintering grounds in the forests of Mexico.
The monarch population has seen a rapid decline in the last few years, though they have been on the decline for the last 15 years in the U.S.
The monarch butterflies covered 0.67 hectares of Mexico’s forests during the 2013-2104 winter, and this was a drop of 44 percent from 2012.
This number was 10 times less than the average monarch coverage from 1994-2014 of 6.39 hectares.
The declining numbers are being blamed primarily on the loss of milkweed, which are the natural feeding grounds of monarch caterpillars.
Monarch caterpillars are voracious eaters and they need to consume a lot of milkweed to survive. Milkweed is being destroyed at an alarming and efficient rate by the herbicides used to protect herbicide resistant GMO crops, like corn and soybean.
