Live from the Montréal Insectarium! Over 500 Monarchs Leaving for Mexico

MONTREAL, Aug. 13, 2012 /CNW Telbec/ - Within a few days, hundreds of monarch butterflies will be setting out on their annual migration to Mexico. If you'd like to see them before their southbound odyssey, join the team from the Insectarium, a Montréal Space for Life, outdoors for the Monarch Odyssey on August 18, 19, 25, 26 and September 1, 2 and 3, at 2:30 p.m. Learn about the different steps in a monarch's development and how this tiny animal weighing less than half a gram manages to make the longest migration of any insect: more than 4,000 kilometres. You can also watch Insectarium staff tagging these well-known butterflies with their trademark orange and black-veined wings as part of the Monarch Watch international research program at the University of Kansas, supported by Canada, the United States and Mexico.

Giving biodiversity a hand
To complement the Monarch Watch program, the Insectarium has been running its Monarchs Without Borders program for close to twenty years now, providing over 1,000 monarch-raising kits for educators, families and individuals interested in this amazing migration. Starting in the first week of September, participants receive caterpillars, chrysalises, a milkweed plant, Monarch Watch tags and access to a micro-website with information on raising monarchs and their biology. A few weeks later, they too can tag their lovely monarchs and wave goodbye as they head off on their migration!

A little piece of paradise for monarchs (NEW)
A new Monarch Garden, next to the Insectarium, will be full of milkweed - an essential ingredient in monarch reproduction. Butterflies were already excited about their new habitat and surrounded the gardeners as they planted the new garden! This new space will be the perfect place to get a close-up look at monarchs' life cycle and behaviour. Their migration is threatened, in fact, because of habitat destruction (deforestation, pesticides, etc.). Why not create your own butterfly garden? Choose a sunny spot out of the wind in your yard or even on your balcony and plant some nectar-bearing flowers and a few milkweed plants. Monarchs won't be able to resist, and you'll soon be enjoying all kinds of enchanting black and orange-winged visitors!

Some facts about monarch migration

• During their long journey they fly only during the day;
  
  
• When night comes, they rest at migratory stops that they may identify thanks to chemical traces left by generations of butterflies from previous years. Many of these rest areas have now been turned into large ecological centres, where butterflies are protected;
  
  
• They are energy-conservation experts (using the wind to carry them along);
  
  
• They cover an average of 80 to 120 km every day.

On the same site …
Would you like to learn more about global biodiversity? Come visit the 1000 Days for the Planet  Base Camp at the Botanical Garden, meet enthusiastic researchers and communicators interested in all life forms, and you could even chat live with the crew of the Sedna IV, on their 1000 Days for the Planet mission!

SOURCE: Espace pour la vie

For further information:

Nadine Fortin, Communications Co-ordinator
514 868-3053
[e-mail]

François Ouellet, Communications Assistant
514 872-3232
[e-mail]