What do you think of when you hear the words, “butterfly”? Do you imagine a small, majestic, winged creature that you often see fluttering around the garden or backyard? Yes, I thought so. But that’s not how everybody may see monarchs. Farmers, gardeners, and even you depend on butterflies! Whether we know it or not.
The Process of Pollinating
Take farmers, for instance. They depend on pollinators, including this insect, or insecta, for their plants to blossom and develop. Do you often see a monarch resting on a flower’s anther? Only to fly away again to the next nectar-bearing plant? Well, that’s how the system begins. The butterfly’s tarsi grips the anther of a flower, while the proboscis, (the tongue), sucks the nectar and water to …show more content…
Due to habitat loss, the disappearing numbers of milkweed, overwintering, droughts in California, and insecticide and herbicide, which aren’t meant to harm them, but sadly, does. However, there are many ways you can save the monarchs AND other butterflies. You can donate to charities, or conservations, such as Monarch Wings Across America Project. Or, you can even plant milkweed, flowers, bushes, etc.. Milkweed is a necessity to the monarch butterflies, for they lay their eggs and their caterpillars can only feast on this plant. As I mentioned above, the loss of milkweed is caused by land management. Many other species also count on milkweed as a food source, so basically it’s a win-win for the monarchs and other species of bugs! Monarchs migrate through Mexico, California, and Kansas, and they need places to rest and feed on the way. Land management, (again), and logging is depleting these “pit-stops,” so the monarchs are left with less choices of where to stop. So, planting, donating, fund-raising, and learning more about this specific animal can help raise the awareness, and raise the butterfly population. There are many other ways to help, so how will you help monarch butterflies
The Process of Pollinating
Take farmers, for instance. They depend on pollinators, including this insect, or insecta, for their plants to blossom and develop. Do you often see a monarch resting on a flower’s anther? Only to fly away again to the next nectar-bearing plant? Well, that’s how the system begins. The butterfly’s tarsi grips the anther of a flower, while the proboscis, (the tongue), sucks the nectar and water to …show more content…
Due to habitat loss, the disappearing numbers of milkweed, overwintering, droughts in California, and insecticide and herbicide, which aren’t meant to harm them, but sadly, does. However, there are many ways you can save the monarchs AND other butterflies. You can donate to charities, or conservations, such as Monarch Wings Across America Project. Or, you can even plant milkweed, flowers, bushes, etc.. Milkweed is a necessity to the monarch butterflies, for they lay their eggs and their caterpillars can only feast on this plant. As I mentioned above, the loss of milkweed is caused by land management. Many other species also count on milkweed as a food source, so basically it’s a win-win for the monarchs and other species of bugs! Monarchs migrate through Mexico, California, and Kansas, and they need places to rest and feed on the way. Land management, (again), and logging is depleting these “pit-stops,” so the monarchs are left with less choices of where to stop. So, planting, donating, fund-raising, and learning more about this specific animal can help raise the awareness, and raise the butterfly population. There are many other ways to help, so how will you help monarch butterflies