WICHITA FALLS ( KFDX/KJTL ) — Tracking a cross-continental journey through the middle of the United States isn’t easy, but it might be the key to the future of the monarch butterfly species.

Every year, butterflies leave their breeding grounds in the northern U.S. and Canada and fly to particular groves in Mexico for the winter. However, the migration is under threat due to various challenges the butterflies face, such as food loss and deforestation. Debra Halter and the Texas Master Naturalists are trying to save the butterflies by tagging them and keeping track of where they came from before reaching Mexico.

“They bring them in and then they read the tags on it, and they can tell us where they were tagged, where, how far they came,” Halter said. “Because some of them have been tagged up in Michigan and then recovered there. Some of them go over 3,000 miles.”

The Texas Master Naturalists are hoping by tracking the monarch migration and helping with conservation efforts related to that species, they can also save other butterfly species from the same fate.

Lynn Seman, another member of the Rolling Plains Chapter of the Texas Master Naturalists, said starting with monarchs is crucial.

“If we love and care for the monarch butterfly, we’re also caring for a lot of other species that sometimes get overlooked,” Seman said. “What we do to help the monarch butterfly also helps the other species in the same environment.”

Once the monarchs reach Mexico, their several thousand-mile journey is over. That is, before they inevitably travel back north to start the whole cycle over again, showing why they’re one of the most remarkable insects in North America.

“It’s just amazing that this little bitty butterfly that has maybe a three-inch-long wingspan that makes it all the way from southern Canada, travel sometimes 3,000 miles to get to one particular set of groves in Mexico,” Halter said. “They always go to the same place. They’ve never been there before, but they know how to get there.”

With every year, new monarchs fly south and come back north again, and the Texas Master Naturalists want to be on the front lines, keeping the species and the incredible migration alive.

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