The peril of our beloved Monarch

PLANT, PRESERVE AND ADVOCATE FOR THE MILKWEED FAMILY (Aesculus),

WHY?

This plant family is the the only lifeline for the endangered Monarch butterfly. On it’s migration northward from the depleted forests where it winters to the wind-swept prairies of the Southwest, to the monoculture cornfields of the Midwest; the monarch is not doing well. And then there it the MONSANTO monster called ‘BT’ ready corn. This genetically altered corn hybrid creates pollen that, once adrift, kills all larvae, including that of the monarch butterfly. So, there you have it. In a decade or two, you may only see images of monarchs on a site like this. Let’s hope not.

Fragrant, draws all osrts of unusual bugs, and of course-the Monarchs, which will lay eggs on this plant

They may rebound.  But it is not looking so swell. From record populations (in Mexico during winter) in the hundreds of millions  documented for a millennia, to a paltry few million or less this year is alarming, as seen (or not) in the forests on one small but important area near central Mexico. There too the problems for this fragile creature are present: illegal logging.  Though slowed and perhaps even stopped, the damage has been done. It seems that the lack of dense forest cover in the mountains where they used to ‘ drape the trees’, has thus allowed colder temperature to penetrate- and a few winters have had devastating results.

Monarch larvae on a milkweed plant seen in one the natural areas near Chicago .