A New Way to Help the Monarch Butterfly - Jonas Miller

Monarch butterflies are one of the most iconic insects in North America, largely thanks to their beautiful coloration and epic migration. Every year, adult butterflies travel from wherever they metamorphosized to mountain region of Baja California, where they congregate in massive groves within temperate alpine forests to wait out the long winter. It is truly a magical sight to behold, and something I would love to see with my own eyes.

Tragically, monarchs are not immune to the gradual loss of insect biodiversity and population density witnessed in the last 50 years. The monarch host plant, the milkweed, is the only kind of plant larval monarchs eat for a number of reasons. Milkweed is poisonous to most other animals, meaning competition for the food resource is low. Furthermore, the caterpillars can retain the poison from their food and keep it in their body, in turn making them poisonous to a potential predator. For a number of years milkweed was treated as a nuisance plant, which resulted in the decline of monarchs. In recent years, the attitude towards milkweed has changed for the sake of the monarch, resulting in a slight population increase.

The return of the milkweed has been important to the monarch's re-establishment in America, however, the insect is not "out of the weeds" yet. A study published in Scientific Reports found that pesticides, may of which were not meant to have any effect on monarchs, can stunt developmental growth, even in trace amounts. The compounds in the pesticides do not have any effect on the caterpillars, which is why they were thought to not have an effect on the species, however, the study found that the average wing length in adults exposed to pesticides as larva is smaller than average by 12.5% (Olaya-Arenas et al., 2020). This decrease in wing size makes it significantly harder for adult monarchs to complete their migration. In the name of preserving monarchs, it is essential that the use of pesticides containing azoxystrobin and trifloxystrobin should not be applied in monarch-sensitive locations.

Olaya-Arenas, P., K. Hauri, M. E. Scharf, and I. Kaplan. 2020. Larval Pesticide Exposure Impacts Monarch Butterfly Performance. Scientific Reports 10(1), 14490.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Kip Redick Example of a Student's Choosing

  This is an example of a topic of the student's choosing.   During the summer of 2022, I attended an environmental encounters trip to Iceland with Dr. Kip Redick, Dr. Joe Balay, and 14 other students. It was a two week trip, but those short two weeks completely changed my life. I learned about more things than I thought was possible in 14 days, and I've never been more interested in learning before. It completely opened my eyes to a whole new perspective, on how the world should live, and what the environment should look like. Everyone was so kind, and they are the most environmental conservative countries.  While there, we did many different activities, including hiking on a glacier. It was so fun, but exhausting and kind of sad at the same time. It was obvious to see how much the glacier have had melted in the past years due to global warming, as there was a large glacial lake at the bottom with melted ice, and the glacier was all rock and sediment before w...
Read more

Kip Redick Example of an Outside Reading Post

 Recently I decided to give the renowned masterpiece by Jon Krakauer known as Into the Wild  another read. Needless to say I was just as heartbroken as the first time I read this novel/watched the 2007 film. I felt the need to discuss the work here simply because I feel it relates to a lot of discussions we have been having in class. I mean think about it, a young man sets out across the country to explore creation as it was intended to be experienced. As the story progresses, I remember being left with a sense of wonder, even thinking things along the lines of "I wonder would what happen if I just decided to do this one day?" I feel it's common knowledge how this story ends by now, with the main protagonist passing away alone in the wilderness, no one around for miles due to accidentally ingesting a poisonous plant. Although I have previously discussed how nature is God's most pure creation and should be treated as such, I feel I need to address a differ...
Read more

Kip Redick Student's Free Choice Example

  Here is an example which would be a free choice entry.    Since last semester, I have been on e-board for the Green Team at CNU. I am the sustainability and research chair and my role is to make campus more green and sustainability which is challenging because CNU tends to be stubborn and not want to change. Although I have been struggling to do my job and change things, I have gotten so much insight from the other Green Team members because we come from different customs and view points. We have bonded over our love for the environment and our need to change. We have our own rituals were we try to connect with nature through meditation, yoga, and reciting poems and sharing ideas. We have a big/little system called Oaks and Acorns in order for new members to know how the group works and become close to each other. Green Team is not dominated by one class, one religion, or one race. That is why I love this organization so much. We are all accepted and brought...
Read more