Last month, government officials met in Washington, DC, for the first Monarch Butterfly Summit, just as the milkweed in the “Monarch Waystations” that are now ubiquitous across American lawns began to bloom. Like everyone, they were worried about the iconic insect’s fate, following decades of notable population decline in the butterfly’s winter colonies.
There are two distinct (but genetically identical) populations of monarchs in the United States, and both are migratory. Monarchs west of the Rocky Mountains spend their winters in Southern California, while those east of the range fly thousands of miles from
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