The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and University of Illinois-Chicago announced what’s being billed as the largest agency-industry agreement to boost pollinator habitat in our nation’s history earlier this month. More than 40 energy and transportation companies in the … Read More
One group of travelers not canceling their flight plans this spring: monarch butterflies. That said, the migratory population currently heading north from their winter roosts in Mexico will be 53% smaller than last year. The World Wildlife Fund Mexico (WWF) … Read More
Ocampo, Michoacán — It’s a Thursday in February at El Rosario Monarch Butterfly Preserve in Michoacán, Mexico. Groups of Mexican school children mingle with tourists from all over the world. Visitors crowd around a muddy crossing, as a seep of … Read More
On Sunday, October 20, San Antonio will have a unique opportunity to learn the Waggle Dance, the unique, booty-shaking romp that bees perform for each other to communicate the location of nectar and pollen. Never heard of the Waggle Dance? … Read More
SAN ANTONIO — Monarch butterflies have begun their southbound migration in what could be a banner year. The iconic black and orange butterflies will start arriving here in the coming weeks, with peak migration for our latitude slated for October … Read More
A new study that suggests monarch butterflies fostered from the wild or cultivated by commercial breeders have trouble migrating and can exhibit unusual genetic traits hit the monarch butterfly community this week. The reaction has been intense. “Boy, you gotta … Read More
Three of 690 commercially bred monarch butterflies tagged and released at San Antonio’s 2018 Monarch Butterfly and Pollinator Festival were recovered in Mexico, citizen science organization Monarch Watch announced this week. Monarch Watch founder Chip Taylor, who oversees the citizen science … Read More
South Texas is seeing an abundance of monarch butterfly caterpillars in recent weeks. Resulting chrysalises and butterflies suggest a robust 2019 monarch butterfly season as a bounty of wildflowers awaits. Monarchs typically leave their overwintering roosts in the Mexican mountains … Read More
Migration studies expert Andy Davis sometimes finds himself at odds with the running narrative of the monarch butterfly migration. Davis, a research scientist in the University of Georgia Odum School of Ecology, specializes in conservation physiology, a developing field that … Read More
Monarch butterflies have begun their multi-generation migration north from Mexico, following a season that counted their largest overwintering population in a decade. Favorable conditions in South Texas suggest we may be in for another great year. Early reports had the … Read More