After record low, monarch butterflies return to California

Butterflies land on branches at Monarch Grove Sanctuary in Pacific Grove, Calif., Wednesday, Nov. 10, 2021. The number of Western monarch butterflies wintering along California's central coast is bouncing back after the population reached an all-time low last year.

An annual winter count last year by the Xerces Society recorded fewer than 2,000 butterflies, a massive decline from the tens of thousands tallied in recent years and the millions that clustered in trees from Northern California’s Mendocino County to Baja California, Mexico in the south in the 1980s. Now, their roosting sites are concentrated mostly on California’s central coast.

Monarchs from across the West migrate annually to about 100 wintering sites dotting central California’s Pacific coast. One of the best-known wintering places isa city-owned site in the coastal city of Pacific Grove, where last year no monarch butterflies showed up. This year a preliminary count showed more than 13,000 monarchs have arrived at the site in Monterey County, clustering together on pine, cypress and eucalyptus trees and sparking hope among the grove’s volunteers and visitors that the struggling insects can bounce back.Scientists don’t know why the population increased this year but Jepsen said it is likely a combination of factors, including better conditions on their breeding grounds.

The Western monarch butterfly population has declined by more than 99% from the millions that overwintered in California in the 1980s because of the destruction of their milkweed habitat along their migratory route as housing expands into their territory and use of pesticides and herbicides increases.

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