Eastern Monarch Butterfly Population Falls Again
WASHINGTON - The yearly count of Monarch butterflies overwintering in Mexico, released today (see table below), continues to show a dramatic decline of the imperiled species. Today's count of 2.10 hectares (5.2 acres) of occupied winter habitat is down 26% from last year's count. The minimum population threshold needed to be out of the danger zone of extinction is six hectares.
Overall, eastern monarchs have declined by more than 80% over the past two decades.
"Monarchs are the face of the wildlife extinction crisis where even once common species could now disappear. They need us because if we don't act now to save them, monarch migrations will collapse and that would be morally unforgivable," said Tierra Curry, a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity.
The eastern Monarch population is made up the butterflies east of the Rocky Mountains and accounts for roughly 99% of all North American Monarchs. They migrate each winter to oyamel fir forests on high elevation mountaintops in central Mexico. Scientists estimate the population size by measuring the area of trees turned orange by the clustering butterflies. That population has been dangerously low since 2008.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in December put Monarchs on the waiting list for Endangered Species Act listing, which confers no actual protection to them or their habitat. The Service itself has estimated up to an 80% probability of population collapse for eastern Monarchs within 50 years and a 96-100% probability for the western population.
https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/2021/02/25/eastern-monarch-butterfly-population-falls-again?cd-origin=rss
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