{"id":43545,"date":"2014-06-02T12:00:26","date_gmt":"2014-06-02T11:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=43545"},"modified":"2015-05-05T21:33:47","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T20:33:47","slug":"monsanto-vs-the-monarchs-the-fight-to-save-the-worlds-most-stunning-butterfly-migration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2014\/06\/monsanto-vs-the-monarchs-the-fight-to-save-the-worlds-most-stunning-butterfly-migration\/","title":{"rendered":"Monsanto vs. the Monarchs: The Fight to Save the World\u2019s Most Stunning Butterfly Migration"},"content":{"rendered":"

North America is on the verge of losing one of its most spectacular phenomena.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"(Credit:<\/a>

(Credit: CathyKeifer via iStock)<\/p><\/div>\n

Monarch butterflies are pretty impressive insects: Aside from that whole metamorphosis thing<\/a>, they\u2019re famous for their annual winter migration, an up to 3,000-mile journey<\/a> across Canada, the U.S. and Mexico. The breathtaking spectacle that results when they alight, by the millions, in central Mexico\u00a0is the sort that inspires legends<\/a>, not to mention sustains the country\u2019s tourist industry<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But if the monarchs can be said to have a fatal flaw, it\u2019s that they\u2019re are entirely dependent upon milkweed. And milkweed, once common in the American Midwest, has been all but eliminated from the cropland where it once thrived, the loss a side effect of our growing, and increasingly efficient, industrial agriculture system.\u00a0While the monarch itself isn\u2019t yet endangered, its stunning migration could soon become a thing of the past.<\/p>\n

There are actually a lot of places where we can place the blame for this. The push, by Congress, to use corn-based ethanol as biofuel didn\u2019t help matters, and climate change<\/a> certainly isn\u2019t doing the butterflies any favors, either. The question now is what we\u2019re going to do about it. Enter Chip Taylor, insect ecologist and founder of Monarch Watch<\/a>. The group, which has been operating since 1992 out of the University of Kansas, is hard at work on an enticingly simple solution to all this: if the loss of milkweed is killing the butterflies, then maybe, just maybe, what we need to do is plant more milkweed.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a little more to it, of course. But, as Taylor told Salon, it\u2019s a promising start. The Natural Resources Defense Council and the Berkeley Food Institute agree: this May, they honored him with a Growing Green award<\/a>\u00a0for his work as a \u201cpollinator protector.\u201d Taylor spoke with Salon about his 22-year campaign to protect the monarchs, and made a heck of a case for why they\u2019re worth the effort. This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.<\/p>\n

I was hoping first you could give us an update on the status of the monarch butterflies. I know they had a really bad winter<\/a> \u2014 has any good news arrived with springtime?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We\u2019ve had three years in a row in which the conditions for reproduction have not been good, and so the population has been going down in part due to the fact we just haven\u2019t had good breeding conditions in each of the previous summers.\u00a0But the main issue with the monarchs is the long-term trend. It\u2019s been the loss of habitat. And if we hadn\u2019t lost so much habitat we wouldn\u2019t be worrying so much about the population, because we\u2019d still have a pretty good base.<\/p>\n

The long-term loss of habitat has been due to the adoption of herbicide-tolerant crops. As herbicide-tolerant crops really began to increase in about the year 2000, then we began to see an impact on the population. The reason for that is monarchs are dependent on milkweeds, and it turned out that milkweeds were actually growing in corn and soybean fields, in modest numbers \u2014 not enough to cause crop damage or interfere with crop production. Monarchs are totally dependent on milkweeds to reproduce; without milkweeds there are no monarchs. So as these herbicide-tolerant plants were adopted more and more, we saw progressive elimination of milkweeds in the field crops. I should mention that the reason the milkweeds still persisted in the field crops was that prior to the year 2000 most of the weeds were controlled by tillage. Milkweeds survived that better than most weeds did, and that\u2019s why they still persisted in those fields despite the fact there was weed control. But once we had the herbicide-tolerant plants coming into the system we lost the milkweeds.<\/p>\n

By the year 2006 [and] 2007 there was virtually no milkweed left in corn and soybean fields. We really saw tension,\u00a0and the population really started to go down. And then we had the ethanol mandate<\/a>, which President Bush signed at the end of 2007. Farmers knew that the price of corn was going to go up because of the demand to produce ethanol, and so what happened over the next five years was that the growers all over the upper Midwest looked for everything they possibly could convert into cropland, and they converted something like 24 million acres<\/a> of grassland habitat, wetland habitat \u2014 anything they could get they converted to crops. And so that\u2019s a tremendous conversion rate in five years. 24 million acres. I mean that\u2019s just astounding, and it works out to be the size of the state of Indiana. You can\u2019t lose that much habitat without having an impact on a lot of things out there. There are a lot of pollinators that are living in those habitats, a lot of ground-nesting birds, just an awful lot of species. At the same time, part of that 24 million was 11.2 million acres of CRP\u00a0<\/a>[Conservation Reserve Program] land.\u00a0So Congress got into this in a big way, in that they first of all approved the ethanol mandate and secondly approved the reduction in CRP land from something like 37 million acres down to about 25.5 million acres now.<\/p>\n

So monarchs are down for a number of reasons: They\u2019re down for all those habitat reasons and now they\u2019re down because of those seasonal conditions. But things are looking better this year: I\u2019m predicting there will be a modest increase in the population. Next winter they\u2019ll be better than they were this past winter \u2014 but that\u2019s an easy prediction, that it\u2019s going to be slightly better. What I can\u2019t really do is project how much better it\u2019s going to be. All I can say it\u2019s going to be positive. All the conditions right now indicate a positive change in the population, and an increase in number. Just how much of an increase we\u2019ll have to wait and see.<\/p>\n

Just to back up a little bit: When we talk about the genetically modified crops and the weed resistance, we\u2019re referring to Monsanto and GMO crops \u2014 two of the environmental community\u2019s favorite villains. How certain are we that they\u2019re the main thing responsible for the decline of the butterflies?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think there\u2019s any question about it. The statistics are really quite clear. I mean, the fact is that you could go out and take pictures of milkweed in cornfields around the year 2000 \u2014 and I have such pictures \u2014 and the fact is you can\u2019t find it anymore. I mean, it\u2019s gone. And the fact is also that we knew it was a highly productive habitat. There\u2019s no question that the milkweed has gone down and as a consequence the monarchs have gone down. The first statement that I made on this was in 1999, and I said this was going to happen. I got a letter from a farmer in 2004 and he said, \u201cWell, you know, I have adopted new technology and it\u2019s eliminating all the milkweed and it\u2019s going to eliminate the monarch butterflies.\u201d I had a farmer tell me that in 2004. And you know, it\u2019s obvious. You go back and look at what was going on in those fields, and there was milkweed, and now there isn\u2019t. We\u2019ve lost a hundred million acres of milkweed-containing habitat, which is due to new technology.<\/p>\n

When Congress passed the ethanol mandate in 2007, was there any recognition that this was something that might happen that might occur as a side effect? Did the loss of milkweed enter into the debate at all, or was it completely overlooked?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think it was overlooked. I mean, I think in both these cases, you look at the herbicide-tolerant crops, you\u2019re looking at an unintended consequence. You look at the ethanol mandate, you\u2019re looking at an unintended, unexpected consequence. In both cases you\u2019re looking at economic and political decisions that favor the individuals, and you can\u2019t blame the individuals for adopting these kinds of technologies. They\u2019re working with the tools that they\u2019re given. So I\u2019m not doing a lot of finger pointing in this round of things because it doesn\u2019t do us any good; we just really have to acknowledge what has happened and then try to do something about it.<\/p>\n

And so the big push now really has to be to adjust to these new realities. And things have changed so much that we\u2019re really down to the eight ball. We\u2019ve got bird species declining throughout the Midwest, especially ground-nesting birds. We\u2019ve got pollinators declining significantly. We\u2019ve got monarch butterflies declining significantly. And the question is, what are we going to do about it? It\u2019s not a matter of pointing fingers at this point, it\u2019s a matter of recognizing we\u2019ve put ourselves in a bind and now we have to make some adjustments, and I think you\u2019re going to hear a lot more about this in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n

Why in the coming weeks?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think there\u2019s a lot of talk going on, both at the federal level and privately, about coming up with some solutions. There\u2019s no money on the table yet, and there are no fleshed-out plans that really speak to implementation and budget issues, so on and so forth, yet. But there\u2019s a lot of movement in that direction. These things take a while to develop, and I think folks are going to see within weeks and perhaps months there will be some plans on the table, there will be some budget considerations. There will be an attempt to actually address these issues.<\/p>\n

Would that be mainly through replanting milkweed?<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not only milkweed. This is going to be about restoring pollinator habitat, and restoring pollinator habitat means you\u2019re restoring a mixed habitat for a lot of nectar plants for honeybees and other pollinators. You\u2019re restoring milkweeds, you\u2019re restoring a lot of grassland. So you\u2019re restoring a diverse thing. We\u2019re not talking about creating monocultures of milkweed, we\u2019re talking about creating natural landscapes that contain a diverse array of maybe 40 different species of plants, that won\u2019t absolutely mimic nature but will get us back to where we are, at the very least, supporting ground-nesting birds, pollinators and monarch butterflies.<\/p>\n

Can you walk through some of the direct implications of the loss of the monarch butterflies? Obviously, this is coming along with the decline of bees and birds and all these other losses, but what\u2019s the import of the monarch, specifically?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well that\u2019s the nuts and bolts of the argument that I have here. The monarch butterflies are symbolic of a lot of other things that are happening on our landscapes. I mean, they tell us the fact that the pollinators are going down, they tell us the ground-nesting birds are going down, the small mammals are going down and so on and so forth. They lost that habitat that they share with all of those other species, and that means all of those other species are going down. And the implications of losing the pollinators are that they keep the system together, I mean they\u2019re a keystone group of organisms.<\/p>\n

The real importance of the monarch butterfly has to do with those relationships. But beyond that, this is a sensational migratory insect. I mean this is a species that unites a continent. This is a species that is involved in one of the most spectacular biological phenomena on the planet. And it\u2019s simply something that we should not lose and don\u2019t want to lose. You have to perhaps go to Mexico to these overwintering sites to fully grasp what I\u2019m talking about here. But to walk into one of the forests and to walk into an area where you have 25 million butterflies per acre is a breathtaking experience, particularly when you realize that most of those butterflies migrated 1,500 or even 2,000 miles to get there. And a lot of them died on the way, and a lot of them are going die before this whole thing starts up again the next spring. I mean, it is truly a biological phenomenon that sparks a lot of wonder, it\u2019s economically important for the people in that region of Mexico and educationally it is one of the things that helps our citizens understand their relationship to the natural world around them.<\/p>\n

The aesthetic appeal must help spark people\u2019s interest, too.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is our most charismatic insect, without a question. This insect, unlike others, is not frightening: it\u2019s accessible, it\u2019s beautiful. Every kid who\u2019s had an opportunity to find a caterpillar and raise it has had a wonderful experience with it, and it\u2019s something that would be a shame to lose. And when I first started this program, one of the things we did was tag a lot of butterflies \u2014 we still do. And I would get notes from people thanking me for connecting them with something large, a phenomenon outside their daily lives, a phenomenon that sparks some wonder, that they were tagging butterflies that were destined to go another 1,200 miles to reach their overwintering sites. That just kind of blew a lot of people away. And they could see hundreds of monarchs passing by their 25-story buildings in Dallas on a daily basis for a week in September and early October. I mean that connected them. They could say, \u201cNow I know what\u2019s going on. This is awesome. I\u2019m glad I\u2019m part of this.\u201d That\u2019s the sort of response I got. And that\u2019s the kind of thing that\u2019s kept this going all these years.<\/p>\n

Tell me a little bit about this initiative for planting new milkweed habitat. How much milkweed needs to be planted to make a difference, to make up for what\u2019s been lost?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There\u2019s a lot that\u2019s been lost. If you go to the website, you\u2019ll see a monarch recovery plan<\/a>, and the stark reality of it is that we\u2019re losing a million to a million and a half acres of habitat a year. Just to run as fast as we can to stay in one place, we have to replace at least that much habitat, and that\u2019s a tall order. And we\u2019re scrambling to figure out how we can replace that much habitat each year, let alone getting back all the things we\u2019ve lost over the last 10 or 15 years. We\u2019re never going to be back to where we were. What we really have to aspire to is to keep the restoration at a level so that we\u2019re not losing ground first, and then try to recover some of what we\u2019ve lost \u2014 but we\u2019re never going to get back to the 10- or 12-hectare populations that we saw in the past. We had a population in 1996 that was just incredible: it was almost 20 hectares of butterflies, almost a billion butterflies, and we\u2019re never going see that. What we really want to do is get back to a level where we\u2019re seeing something like 3 or 4 hectares of butterflies at the overwintering sites every year. We could maintain a stable sort of situation with that many butterflies; that\u2019s what it really takes to deal with the ups and downs of this population. But we don\u2019t have that much habitat right now, so we\u2019re going to have to build up to the point at which we have a stable population that has enough habitat to maintain those numbers.<\/p>\n

Are we at the point right now where we\u2019re worried about the monarch going extinct? Is the population that unstable?<\/strong><\/p>\n

No, we\u2019re not \u2014 it\u2019s not going to go extinct. But we could lose the migration, which would be a shame. You\u2019ve got this eastern North America which has this wonderful migration that people experience every fall \u2014 I mean, I\u2019ve got friends who go to football games and they watch the monarchs flying through the stadiums in the fall as much as they watch the football because it\u2019s really a cool thing to see. To point out to your friends, \u201cHey look at that, there goes a monarch, and there\u2019s another one. Do you know what they\u2019re doing? They\u2019re on their way to Mexico.\u201d Pretty cool.<\/p>\n

Anyway, as far as what we\u2019re doing, last year we pioneered for ourselves a milkweed plug protection system. I couldn\u2019t get nurseries to produce milkweeds. They said there\u2019s no market. So I decided to produce 25,000 milkweeds anyway, and see if I could find a market, and I did. I found a market for about 21 or 22,000 of those 25,000 milkweeds last year. And so this year we started up growing 50,000 milkweed plugs. We\u2019ve already distributed about 30,000 of those and we\u2019re scrambling now to distribute the other 20,000. And that\u2019s a big project; I mean, 30, 40,000 of anything is really a lot to handle with a small operation like we have. And it\u2019s a drop in the bucket in terms of what\u2019s really needed out there, but it\u2019s a start. And everything has to start one way. So if we had 100 nurseries doing what we\u2019re doing, and had the customers for that, then we\u2019d be having a real impact. Right now we\u2019re having a small impact, we\u2019re engaging a lot of the people that are really interested in this, and they\u2019re going to be spreading the word, and every year it\u2019s going to get bigger.\u00a0I\u2019ve already talked to the nursery\u00a0about what we\u2019re going to do next year, and we\u2019re probably talking about 70,000, maybe 80,000 plugs. So that\u2019ll only be the third year of this program and we\u2019re certainly going to be getting other nurseries involved. I\u2019m developing partnerships with other nurseries now that they\u2019re seeing there\u2019s a market. I\u2019m sending people lots of customers.<\/p>\n

So hopefully we can build this up so that we really do have an impact eventually. But we need to get the gardeners across the country involved; we need to get all the master gardeners, master naturalists, we need to get all the parks and cities involved. We need to make this a national priority because we need to get all hands on deck. We need to get everybody across the country into this. Because we do have issues with monarch butterflies and pollinators and ground-nesting birds and small mammals and we need to maintain the habitat for them. We can\u2019t just convert everything into an agricultural field or an urban environment. We have to maintain the wildlife out there. This is as fundamental as our relationship with nature, but also the reality is about 70 percent of that native vegetation out there is insect pollinated and if you don\u2019t have the insects, you lose the plants, and if you don\u2019t have the plants you lose the things that feed on those plants. So we\u2019ve got to keep this system together. People don\u2019t understand this, but everything\u2019s connected out there and we have to maintain those connections.<\/p>\n

___________________________<\/p>\n

Lindsay Abrams is an assistant editor at Salon, focusing on all things sustainable.<\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 salon.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Monarch butterflies are pretty impressive insects famous for their annual winter migration, an up to 3,000-mile journey across Canada, the U.S. and Mexico. North America is on the verge of losing one of its most spectacular phenomena.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-43545","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43545","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43545"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43545\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43545"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43545"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43545"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}