Essay on Monarch Butterfly

I enjoyed my many years of participation in the Monarch Larvae Monitoring Project. Milkweed is the larvae's host plant. Unfortunately common milkweed (asclepias syriaca) has not done well

A study from Cornell University states that monarch butterflies are jeopardized by the lack of milkweed. Monarch butterflies are unable to survive without milkweed, as this is the only thing their caterpillars eat. Aside from this, the use of herbicides and genetically modified crops were also said to be threats to the species.

I knew that bees were important pollinators, and their numbers are slowly declining, but I was surprised that Missouri alone has over 450 species of bees, and that there were over twenty thousand species worldwide. Since bees sometimes have only a select few plants that they pollinate, this mass variety helps all types of plants in the different habitats that the bees live in. Due to the monarch’s large distance traveled during their migration, they are able to pollinate various flowers throughout the three countries the fly through. Another interesting thing was that because monarchs only live an average of eight months, during a migration, there can be up to at least 5 generations of butterflies. This can help bring in monarchs to new regions

Common milkweed, asclepia syricia, is favorite choice among monarch butterflies for host plants to their larvae because of its low toxicity. Because milkweed spreads from runners deep underground, it needs a lot of surface warmth to trigger growth, so it does best as a first emergent or in recently mowed fields where light and heat can reach the soil. Because of this, common milkweed does not perform well in home landscaping. The cool shade offered by broad, leafy perennials inhibit the germination of milkweed. Since landscaped gardens are not cut back in the summer, the milkweed does not get the needed sunlight to send up late shoots for the summer and fall monarch population. I have chosen to include green and purple milkweed for my front gardens.

The Danaus plexxippus, also known as the Monarch butterfly, is spread all throughout North America during various parts of the year. In the summer they can migrate as far north as Canada, and during the winter months they can migrate as far south as Mexico. Because Monarchs cannot withstand low temperatures, they make use of different habitats during summer and cold months. They spend the spring, summer and fall months in various places throughout the United States and Canada, and they overwinter in central Mexico. Monarchs lay their eggs on a species of plant known as a “milkweed.” Because of this, Monarchs can be found wherever there is an abundance of milkweeds. Monarchs are very ecologically important because they provide the service of pollination to many flowers and plants. While it is true the bees are the more prolific pollinators, Monarch butterflies are

The Oregon silverspot butterfly requires a very specific habitat for their survival, particularly for the survival of their larvae. The larvae of the Oregon silverspot butterfly only feed on the hookedspur violet (Viola adunca) and therefore, can only thrive and mature to adulthood in an ecosystem in which conditions are ideal for the growth of this angiosperm.

The monarch butterflies are the most beautiful insects of the world.They are really light they can weight from .27 grams to .75 grams. You can distinguish who the male is by looking for a black spot in the butterfly’s hind wings.The colors of the wings make it seem like they

The class of Lepidoptera (moths and butterflies) is the second largest order in the insect world. Nearly all organisms begin the form of larvae called caterpillars (Meyer 2009). After undergoing a pupae stage, the adults emerge with "distinctive...large wings (relative to body size) which are covered with minute overlapping scales" (Meyer 2009). The front wings are large and triangular-shaped while the hind wings are smaller and fan-shaped (Meyer

The monarch butterfly is one of the most familiar species, and is considered important because of its pollinating skills. This species is most recognizable for is black, orange, and white wings. The monarch butterflies wings change colors from orange to a deep red, from beginning to the end of migration. This butterfly population has been decreasing over the last ten years, and are predicted to be quasi-extinct over the next 20 years. These butterflies keep warm by opening their wings up to the sun. Males have a different appearance than the female butterflies such as they are much bigger in size, and the black veins on their wings are narrower than those of a female. The monarch butterfly has six legs, but only uses four. They use their middle

The Skipper Butterfly is in the family Hesperiidae. They have a wingspan of 29 to 31 millimeters, 1.14 to 1.22 inches, and are 2.5 to 6 inches, 6.604 to 15.24 centimeters, in length. This butterfly’s appearance is different than other butterflies in many ways. The antennae club is hooked backwards like a crochet hook while the typical butterflies have club-like tips to their antennae. They have stockier bodies and larger compound eyes, and they have stronger wing muscles in the plump thorax, resembling many moths than the other two butterfly lineages, which are Rhopalocera and Papilionoidea. Their wings are usually smaller than their bodies and when at rest they are angled upwards or spread out and rarely folded up completely. Their wings are more well-rounded with less sharply-tipped forewings. They either have prominent hindwing tails or more angled wings. They come in the colors of browns and grays; some are more boldly black-and-white.

Have you ever learned about the monarch butterfly? Read on to find out about them.

The reason why I chose this piece of work is because we want to help the monarch butterflies population. We decided to make a garden to save the monarch butterflies by planting milkweed for the adult butterfly to lay its eggs on the milkweed. The monarchs are at risk due to climate change, habitat loss, and pesticides sprayed all over the milkweed. I took pictures with my iPad to see the change in the garden. We had to research the monarch butterflies. We had to think about the decorations from the recycled trays. I would like to do differently the decorations of the butterfly by making them perfect. The problem I had to overcome was I had to do research.I overcame the obstacle because i did it and I thought it was hard. If I could

The hemispheric migration of wildlife is in widespread decline specifically in the Monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus). This species is known for its long-distance migration from its non-breeding location in Mexico to the breeding sites encompassing the south, central, and north regions of eastern North America. The main context provided in the introduction is that for predicting future population viability, it is crucial we understand the impact of environmental and anthropogenic threats on the vital rates of the species at different times and locations in its annual cycle. Specifically, there could be different environmental threats at the non-breeding and breeding sites and how they could influence the population could vary depending on how sensitive certain insect stages are to these disturbances. Thus, understanding the spatiotemporal effects are crucial for modeling the dynamics of migratory species and for guiding conservation efforts.

Monarch butterflies embark on a marvelous migratory phenomenon. They travel between 1,200 and 2,800 miles or more from the United States and Canada to central Mexican forests. Their the butterflies hibernate in the mountain forests, where a less extreme climate provides them a better chance to survive. The four stages of the monarch butterfly life cycle are the egg, the larvae (caterpillar), the pupa (chrysalis), and the adult butterfly. The four generations are actually four different butterflies going through these four stages during one year until it is time to start over again with stage one and generation one. Monarch butterflies are not able to survive the cold winters in most of the United States so they migrate south and west each autumn to escape the cold weather. The monarch migration usually starts in about October of each year, but can start earlier if the weather turns colder sooner than that.

The next “great idea” was to have GE crops with insecticides. This meant less use of pest control sprays to keep out the unwanted insects. However, just like the theory of the “super weed” many insects have become more tolerable to the insecticides used in the crops like some populations of mosquitos did to the now banned pesticide DDT. Not only that, but some GE crops with insecticides have already caused unintentional harm to many non-crop damaging insects such as the monarch caterpillars. The fear is that the pollen from the GE insecticide crops will blow over to a neighboring non GE crop such as milkweed which caterpillars feed on. If the monarch caterpillars eat the GE crop pollen they will die. Unfortunately, there is no way to create a toxin that only kills crop damaging insects (Harmful or Helpful?). Another reason why genetically engineered crops are seriously flawed and should not be grown for the safety of the environment that surrounds them.