The great migration of Monarch butterflies
Good morning world Steemit, this time I want to share with you a little about the natural world and its behavior, specifically I will talk about the life of an insect called "Monarch Butterfly". Since I heard about the so-called "Butterfly Effect" your theory of chaos and how according to some theories, the flutter produced by flying through these millions of "Lepidoptera" can cause a typhoon on the other side of the world, whether it is true or false, even I do not know, it only makes me think about the incredible power of nature and how there are certain things or "effects" that we do not imagine could happen or have repercussions in our environment. One of the things that catches my attention, is like every year, at the end of October, you can witness "The great migration", a shocking natural spectacle that is unparalleled, to be able to observe as colonies composed of more than 20 million of individuals, with bright reddish orange wings, elegant black ribs and white spots on the banks, they arrive to hibernate, covering the trees and the sky itself with its radiant beauty. In addition, the evolutionary cycle and the metamorphosis through which these insects pass before finally being a butterfly.
That is why in this post, I want to show and explain in the most practical and simple way you can "The great journey" that monarch butterflies undertake, the way how millions of these harmless and apparently feeble insects travel through thousands of kilometers, to finally fulfill his life purpose "to maintain the life of his species". In addition, I will show a bit how this species is being affected once again by human activity, industrial development, invasion and felling of the areas where they live are butterflies. Finally I will talk about what some people and governments are currently doing to preserve the life of this species and how we can contribute a grain of sand to this problem.
With no more to add, let's start then at the beginning ... defining some concepts.
What is a butterfly?
The butterflies or lepidoptera (Lepidoptera, from the Greek "lepis", scale, and "pteron", wing) are an order of holometabolous insects, almost always flying. Recognized worldwide as one of the most beautiful and attractive insects in sight, the lepidoptera (order of the animal world that includes both butterflies and moths) is undoubtedly one of the most abundant insects on the planet. Source (1,2)
The lepidoptera are the second largest group of insects that exist, they are not species of extraordinary colors that undertake delicate flights at sunrise. It should be noted that the vast majority of butterflies do not see them, they go unnoticed, they are nocturnal, among them the moth, like the diurnal ones, their life is short, only a few weeks. The moths are the largest size as the Emperor that measures up to 30 centimeters in wingspan. They have adapted to the absence of the sun, have adapted for sight in the dark and their body is lined with a soft coat that keeps the heat in some. They are of brown colors, with spots to intimidate their predators, also there are them in yellow, ocher or orange colors that are camouflaged in the environment.
Like other insects, butterflies have two large eyes, which are sometimes made up of miles of microscopic eyes of hexagonal shape, light penetrates through the micro lens and only a part of the image because each hexagon looks in a different direction, acting as natural pixels, so the vision obtained by a butterfly is fragmented like a mosaic. Although the eyes of the butterflies have no ability to focus, if they capture light, movement and a visual range of 180°, which allows them to approach, evade an obstacle and land in a safe place. The bodies of the butterflies are constituted basically by the head, which has compound eyes, proboscis and antennae. The compound eyes give the butterfly a mosaic image of the world around it. It also has Proboscis, which long resembles a suction tube, used for food purposes such as drinking water or plant nectar. Antennas used to detect odors in the air, which are useful for finding food or avoiding danger. Thorax is the area where the wings and legs join the body Figure 1.
The legs attached to the thorax, are 6, used to determine if the object where they land contains sugar, the primary source of food for the butterflies. The wings are 4, with the front wings longer and thinner and the rear wings shorter and rounder. These are covered with very small scales. In the Abdomen it is to the reproductive organs and the digestive organs (Figure 1).
What do the butterflies feed on?
Among the more than 100 thousand species of butterflies in the world, there is one of them that stands out, since it has a particular characteristic, known worldwide for its massive migration (Figure 2). That is why the Monarch Butterfly is one of the best-known species, where each year (prior to the arrival of winter) takes place the displacement of millions of these specimens to the areas of Mexico and California, thus traveling distances greater than 4000 kilometers.
The scientific name of this insect is Danaus plexippus. It is a species of lepidopteroditrisio of the family Nymphalidae. It is perhaps the best known of all the butterflies of North America (Figure 3). These are endowed with an effective defense mechanism that helps throughout his life, and is the fact that in his body have cardiac glycosides, acting as a kind of poison for those species that want to attack them, having a period of life much more prolonged than the rest of the species, being more than 8 months. Source
Longevity and resistance, is what characterizes these insects, which take advantage of these characteristics, to travel more than 4 thousand kilometers (from Canada and the United States of America) to the oyameles forests of the states of Michoacán de Ocampo and Mexico, an area considered as a natural heritage of humanity.Each year, between October and March, monarch butterflies find in the Mexican forests the ideal conditions to develop and mate: altitude (2300-3500 meters above sea level), temperature, humidity and exposure to the solar rays, among others.
Monarch Butterflies date back approximately 250 million years ago. Most of them are born farmers, since they are native to the agricultural fields located in the border strip of southern Canada and the northern United States; place where milkweeds or milky weeds grow - plants belonging to the milkweeds - from which they feed. The asclepias contain an alkaloid that is highly poisonous to other species, but not to the magnificent Monarch Butterfly; it protects it by providing it with an odor and taste that is unpleasant to predators. As a reward for this protection, the Monarch performs extensive pollination work on vast areas of asclepias.
Monarch butterfly moves to generate heat and regulate its temperature, to survive the low temperatures, also perform the diapause, which is that when the cold starts its reproductive cycle and begins the period of hibernation to save energy. These migrate only in the day, because at night they come together in clusters of hundreds of thousands of them, this cluster is called perch or bivouac, the duration of these hangers varies from 2 nights to two weeks, making bunches larger when the wind blows from the south, when the wind blows from the north the number descends. When a butterfly approaches a cluster, the perched butterfly flutters, being the formation of these clusters indispensable for their survival due to the heat that is generated between them. They travel around 120 kilometers per day and make their trip in 33 days, approximately. At the end of March, when they reach maturity, they undertake their return trip to the northern countries.
Life cycle of the monarch butterfly
The conventional Monarch Butterfly has a life cycle that lasts four to five weeks, starting with the egg stage, going through the larval period, later transforming into a pupa or chrysalis, until it becomes a reproductive adult, and then dies. However, when summer is over and temperatures drop drastically, a special generation of Monarchs emerges that will have the task of making the titanic journey that will take them to warmer latitudes to continue the cycle of hibernating, feeding and mating, to Then return home. This is known as the Methuselah Generation. This migratory generation, unlike its ancestors, who enjoyed only ephemeral existences of approximately one month, will remain alive for seven to eight months to achieve their goal of reaching the Oyamel forests. Migratory Monarch butterflies travel an approximate distance of 120 kilometers daily, placing themselves in ascending air currents to take advantage of the impulse and to plan. With this flight technique, the Monarchs only need to flap when they lose the wind or when they want to change course, which allows them to save enough energy to complete their long journey.
At the birth of a caterpillar or larva carries in its genes the perfect formula to become a butterfly, it is its DNA that causes a series of changes that the insect will suffer in its adult stage, then the cycle through which it traverses a butterfly before being previously mentioned butterfly:
Once the female butterfly is fertilized by the male, it looks for the best plant to deposit its eggs, it puts about 400 eggs in the leaves of the milkweed tree, from which they hatch in the form of a larva, of those 400 eggs only arrive to develop from 15 to 20% because the US and Canadian forests do not have enough nutrients to feed billions of butterflies. These eggs eat the eggshell so they can feed on the milkweed plants on which they were born. The butterflies that emerge from the chrysalises in late summer and early fall are different from those that do during the longer, warmer days of summer. These monarch butterflies are born to fly, and they know by the change in climate that they must prepare for their prolonged journey.
When the larvae mature, they get fat, The caterpillars leave the eggs from 3 to 5 days, break the egg with their jaws and also chew the shell, each time they increase in size they also change their skin, this happens from 4 to 5 times, the colors of her body are black, white and bright yellow, and these are ring-shaped in her body, then she does not grow anymore, she simply chooses a stem or leaf, fixes her tail and makes a cocoon creating a Hard protective bag with which cover your body, to become a pupa or chrysalis. From there they emerge in the form of beautifully colored adults in black, orange and white. The colorful pattern of the monarch butterfly makes them easy to identify; and that is precisely what it is about. The caterpillars are fed with milkweeds and grow until after a period of nine days they develop.
The cocoon
The butterfly
When emerging, the butterfly unfolds its wings, dry and can take flight, now its mission will be to reproduce to conserve the species. After the period in the pupa, the butterfly begins to break the cocoon and leaves completely. After 3 days the monarch butterfly begins to develop its organs and begins another cycle of life until it dies. Only the monarch butterflies born at the end of summer or early fall make the migration, and they will make a single round trip. By the time the winter migration of the next begins, several generations of summer will have lived and died, and it will be the great-great-grandchildren of last year's migrants who make the trip. However, in some way new generations know the way. They follow the same routes as their ancestors and sometimes even return to the same tree.
Finally, an image showing each of the previously explained cycles
In mid-March, large colonies of Monarch butterflies can be seen flapping their wings in unison, waiting for rising air currents to propel themselves and thus take flight. Once in territories of the United States, the Methuselah generation will die and the journey will continue as a relay race in which short-lived descendants will continue northward migration for several generations.
Surprisingly, the Monarch Butterflies that will return to the sanctuaries in winter, have never been there before. However, thanks to the guidance being transmitted genetically, next year's Methuselah Monarchs will be able to return without any problem, to the same place their ancestors hibernated. This is the incredible epic of an insect that weighs less than a gram, but whose beauty and importance as pollinating agent and factor of ecological balance, are preponderant.
What is the Methuselah generation?
Adult monarchs live for 4 to 5 weeks, surprisingly those butterflies that migrate from Canada and the United States to spend the winter in central Mexico manage to live up to 9 months, as it is the generation of Methuselah, a genetic treasure that was born in September, In the autumn for monarch butterflies to migrate, each year they travel more than 4000 kilometers advancing tirelessly distances of between 75 to 130 km per day, with the force of 300 to 720 beats per minute.
But, how can they achieve it? The answer is in its more than 16 thousand pairs of genes. A group of scientists from USA, China, Finland, Australia managed to obtain the sequence of the monarch's genome, it is the biological bank of personal information that explains why the characteristics and behavior of this lepidopteran. When they studied they discovered genetic mutations in this migratory insect that their relatives in other regions of the planet do not have, they observed that they resist great distances because they do not marry so easily, their muscles to fly are stronger, they consume less oxygen and their metabolic wear is minimal. The neurobiologist Steven M. Reppert of the University of Massachusetts has studied the inhibition of the juvenile hormone of the monarch which prevents him from reaching his sexual maturity and having a longer life, when a generation is born matusalem not mate like other butterflies do , because their reproductive organs are immature. Its mission is to fly to the south west of Mexico to escape the low temperatures and prevent them from dying.
In the Oyamel forests of the states of Mexico and Michoacán, they enter a state of hibernation, stick to the leaves of the trees forming impressive clusters, when spring arrives, they begin the courtship season. Reppert and his team have also studied the genes involved to make a successful trip of more than 4000 kilometers without fear of being lost, the secret is in the 40 genes involved in the antennas, sophisticated structures that, in addition to perceiving odors, direction of the wind and vibration of the sound, they are sensitive to light, those small rod-shaped filaments are the control of the navigation route and function like a solar compass. The nerve endings of the system send information to the brain about the sun's position, the time of day, and the correct orientation to reach its destination. The fantastic migration of the monarch is the result of the power of genetics an evolutionary wealth that is transmitted from generation to generation an authentic survival lesson.
Some of your eating habits are: a diet in milkweed and its nectar, remedy, weeds as well as water, Both the monarch caterpillar and the adult butterfly feed mainly on milkweed that contains alkaloid, the alkaloid has a horrible taste and makes it toxic for its predators, that is why that a bird that eats some monarch butterflies can vomit, and that one that eats many, can die. An interesting phenomenon is that the Viceroy butterfly mimics the toxic coloration of the Monarch, but these are actually more toxic to their predators, this phenomenon is known as Muller's mimicry, consisting of two toxic species mimicking each other for benefit mutual of both species.
Predators
In the first place you have the calandria, it is a bird of red, black and orange, a little small. In the second place we have the Pico coarse, which is a pajara equally small, black and yellow.
As for the inter specific relation of the monarch butterfly, it is with the milkweed, since it feeds and pollinates it at the same time. This is a benefit for both since the butterfly has its food and the milkweed reproduces.
Habitad
The monarch butterfly is found in a variety of temperate, open, and tropical habitats, since both adult and labor individuals depend on milkweed species for feeding. The monarch butterfly can typically be found in areas of fields, meadows, weed areas and roads where plants are common. During the winter winter the migratory populations winter in fir, pine oak and cedar. This species by nature seeks heat to mate and reproduce.
Currently the habitat of these butterflies is being affected mainly in the United States due to the use of pesticides and fertilizers in the areas of crops that kill the milkweed plant, where butterflies lay their eggs, in addition to the excessive use of herbicides throughout of the migratory route, have affected the growth of the population.
Migratory routes
Monarch butterflies use several migratory routes. In this sense, the migration to the south is divided into two large migrations: migration from the east and from the west. The first is formed by those butterflies that travel from the east of the Rocky Mountains, southern Canada and much of the US to central Mexico (up to 90% of all North American monarch butterflies), down the eastern Sierra Madre, They enter the highlands through the lower mountains and reach the states of Mexico and Michoacán de Ocampo.
Because of its migration from the west, others travel from the Pacific Ocean to the Rocky Mountains to the state of California, and those that inhabit the Atlantic Ocean and the Great Lakes cross the states of Carolina and Florida to reach to Cuba, (they constitute the remaining 10% of the population).
Migration theory of magnetism
One of the most famous migration theories is that of magnetism, which says that butterflies have magnetites in their heads and that is why when you die you do not have to remove the butterfly from the habitat because the butterfly in its journey is guided by the magnetism that exists with the dead butterfly.
Who helps to conserve this species?
The monarch is one of the most impressive butterflies of the entire planet, its migration is a true feat of the entire animal kingdom, governments, universities and civil associations are working so that these butterflies continue to stay where they do, the monarch is a species with a very important pollinator role, reason why there exists (or should exist) an enormous interest to conserve it in all its dispersion range.
Currently, most protection figures in North America are putting all their efforts to improve the conditions of their habitats. Among them, the Reserve of the Biosphere of the Monarch Butterfly of Mexico together with the WWF tries to restore the forests of the zones of hibernation and to promote a sustainable tourism.
Organizations like WWF, Greenpeace or UNEP, have taken responsibility and are working to protect this species. WWF has been working with Monarcas for more than 20 years, this is born from the concern to preserve the migratory phenomenon of the monarchs, making decrees for the protection of the areas where the butterfly comes after its long journey, as well as the expansion of these zones, being in 2013 one of the most critical years where the surface occupied by these butterflies was only 0.6 hectares in the State of Mexico, fortunately this surface has been increasing due to the actions that have been taken.
Despite efforts to protect it, the migratory phenomenon of the North American monarch butterfly could be compromised by anthropogenic pressure, which could endanger the future of these populations. According to recent data provided by the WWF, the area occupied by the butterflies in the hibernation zones has decreased 94% in 10 years, going from 27.48 acres occupied in 2003 to only 1.65 acres in 2013, the most small for 20 years. Reduction in the area occupied by monarch butterflies in hibernation zones (WWF data).
While it is true that, naturally, the area occupied by butterflies in hibernation zones has always fluctuated year after year, so far there has been no such sharp decline and no recovery of these values. Therefore, butterflies are stopping traveling so far south.
These phenomena of recession have also been recorded in other species of butterflies around the world, so there must be some common factor that is affecting their populations.
According to the WWF, the causes that could be compromising the migration of monarchs are:
The reduction of the area of dispersal of the milkweeds (Asclepias spp.): The caterpillars feed exclusively on these plants, from which they acquire their toxicity. However, the use of certain herbicides and changes in rainfall regimes may be limiting their range in much of North America, thus limiting their power supply.
• Deforestation: massive logging and desertification would be reducing their hibernation habitats.
• Extreme climate: the effects of global change, such as the accentuation of north-south temperature differences and changes in rainfall regimes, would hinder the survival of adults beyond a few weeks, preventing migration.
The case of the monarch butterfly is not an isolated fact: today many species with a wide dispersion range see their populations and their migration phenomena compromised due to the impact of different phenomena, which, however much they weigh us, are usually be caused by the human being. There is still a lot of work to do, and it depends on everyone.
How can I help the population of this wonderful insect?
1.- Native cotton plants
If you are one of those who prefer to get down to work, plant cotton plants in your garden. If you live in the north of Mexico, Asclepias asperulala - green leaves - or Asclepias curassavica - or tropical milkweed - are your best options. Not only would you be attracting dozens of butterflies to your home, you would also be collaborating to revitalize their migratory pattern.
If you have pets, plant them out of reach: the milkweed contains alkaloids that, although they serve the butterflies to protect themselves from predators, can be poisonous to other animals.
2.- Create a hostel for monarchs
These areas in your garden are practically a mini-habitat with all the necessary resources for monarchs to produce new generations.
Paradores require the nectar of various flowering plants to feed and strengthen themselves on the road to Mexico, as well as milkweeds to feed their larvae.
3.- Collaborate with organizations and civil entities
If you are far from the migratory route of the monarchs or you live very close to any of them, you can always donate or collaborate as a volunteer in several organizations and civil entities that protect this species. In addition to American organizations such as Save Our Monarchs and Monarch Watch, there are locations in Mexico of the World Wildlife Fund and The Nature Conservancy.
4.- Avoid using herbicides in your garden
If you are in any of the countries within the migratory route of the monarch, but especially in the north and northwestern United States, one of the recommendations of Greenpeace is to avoid herbicides that contain glyphosate.
This product is a chemical that eliminates milkweed plants, one of the main foods of these butterflies, and the only one where they lay their eggs.
But the monarch is not the only one threatened by this chemical: a new study has shown that glyphosate - as well as other pesticides - can also damage DNA and accelerate the cell death of those in contact with it.
5.- Manifest yourself against the disappearance of habitats
Despite federal commitments in Mexico, this year more data and images about the illegal logging that takes place in areas of monarch butterfly butterflies, such as the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve, between the limits of Michoacán, were released. and State of Mexico.
6.- Fight against climate change
The migration of the monarch is triggered by changes in temperature, so an alteration of the cycle could confuse them and break their flight pattern.
So take action to, from home, help in saving energy and taking care of other rich resources will be a step more towards the protection of this and many other species. Source
Once the aspects and characteristics of the Monarch Butterfly have been shown and discussed, the incredible power of nature can be observed, and it reminds us that this power is uncontrollable. This insect is another species that has been touched by the destructive hand of the human being. Faced with this problem, do not act with indifference, and give the next generations the opportunity to enjoy and see unique phenomena like this. The solutions and how to help this species exists, we must only take part in this process and accept the responsibility that corresponds to each one.
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Some sources cited
- Title: Butterfly. Site: Definition ABC. Date: 09/24/2009. Author: Cecilia Bembibre. URL: https://www.definicionabc.com/medio-ambiente/mariposa.php
- https://www.anipedia.net/mariposas/cuerpo-mariposas/
- http://www.alternare.org/
- http://www.wwf.org.mx/quienes_somos/wwf_mundo/
- www.unibio.umam.mx
- • Soymonarca.mx
- • Monarch Butterfly information
- • Monarch Butterfly Fundation
- • Scientific American – “Monarch butterflies Could Gain Endangered Species Protection”
- • CBC News – “Why the monarch butterfly migration may be endangered”
- • National Geographic – “Migrating Monarch Butterflies in “Grave Danger,” Hit New Low“