by Betty Bardswich

M’CHIGEENG—Monarch butterflies are well known throughout the world, not only for their distinctive orange and black colouring, but also for the fact that they can be found in North and South America, New Zealand, Australia, Asia and points in between. They are especially known, however, for the awesome journey that millions of them make each autumn to California and Mexico from Canada and the United States with some flying almost 5,000 kilometres.

It was devastating for environmentalists to learn, then, that the population of these butterflies has fallen drastically in the last 20 years in the eastern United States. As reported by Douglas Main in Newsweek on August 27, the decrease has reached 90 percent and has caused worried conservation groups and a scientist to ask the Fish and Wildlife Service in the United States to designate these insects as threatened.

The loss of so many monarchs has come about through the shortfall of milkweed plants, where the butterflies lay eggs and which are also the only food for the larvae. As prices rose in the past for soybean and corn crops, more and more land was cleared with the devastation of the existing milkweed plants. In Ontario, the agriculture ministry has removed milkweed from its list of noxious plants and Canada lists the plants as a “special concern.” The David Suzuki Foundation calls for a reduction in herbicide and pesticide use and encourages the growing of milkweed plants. Other factors affecting the monarch population include climate change and the illegal practice of deforestation in Mexico.

Here on Manitoulin, students at Lakeview School in M’Chigeeng are doing their part to protect monarchs under the direction of Aanj Maach Taa (AMT or New Beginnings) teacher Connie Freeman and teaching assistant Laurie Beaudin.

The students, from Grades 3 to 6, have been taking the butterflies through their life cycle for three years now and Ms. Freeman is happy to report that the numbers have increased substantially in year three with 22 of these insects in various stages as opposed to three in the first year and six in 2013.

Ms. Freeman’s students showed a great depth of knowledge and enthusiasm as they correctly answered the many questions she had for them. Dakota Cyr explained that the milkweed for the monarch larvae has to be replaced while Waataasiis Mitchell said, “If you use a magnifying glass, you can see a tiny caterpillar with a tiny black spot” as he described how the in-school projects begin. The students were eager to show the life cycle of the butterflies from eggs to larvae, which is the caterpillar state, and on to the chrysalis and the adult insect with the understanding that the release of the butterflies at the final stage can only be done in sunny weather as they cannot fly without the correct body temperature.

Raising butterflies in the classroom and releasing them into the wild is a project of the Monarch Teachers Network of Canada to bring nature into the classroom. And, as Ms. Freeman pointed out, as First Nations people are guardians of the earth, this monarch butterfly enterprise at Lakeview School is a perfect fit.

The latest monarch release at Lakeview School was held on Monday of this week with the students wishing them well on their journey south.