Monarch Butterfly

Description:

The monarch butterfly is undoubtedly one of the most recognized animal species in the world. This is partially due to its wide distribution, but probably more due to its beautiful, striking coloration. The monarch is a medium sized butterfly, measuring about 3 inches from wingtip to wingtip. Its body is about one inch long. Its four wings are generally a field of yellow, orange or gold, with veins of black running through them. A band of black, thickest at the front, rings the wings, and the body is black as well. This black band is usually speckled with white spots, larger at the front and smaller at the back.

Habitat:

Milkweed is the host plant for most of the monarchs life cycle. Eggs are deposited and hatch on the underside of leaves of the milkweed plant. Upon hatching, the larva will feed upon the fine hairs on the leaves of this plant, and stay on this same plant throughout its five molting stages. After molting, the larva will leave the milkweed and construct its chrysalis somewhere else. However, once an adult monarch emerges from the chrysalis, it will soon head back to a milkweed plant for foraging and shelter (Urquhart,1987). The monarchs will spend their summer either in the New England-Great Lakes area, or else in the canyons of the eastern Rocky Mountains. The Great Lakes population will migrate southwest in the fall, and spend the winter in the Sierra Madre mountains of central Mexico. Despite having been studied for so long, it was not until 1976 that their overwintering ground was discovered (Urquhart,1987). That population which spends its summers in the Rocky Mountains will migrate to California and spend the winter in a variety of roosting sites as far north as Monterey, CA. Although their overwintering grounds do not necessarily depend upon the presence of milkweed, they will always return to areas rich in this plant to deposit their eggs.