Long before saving Monarchs became a national concern, members of one family have been working to help the iconic insects, one butterfly at a time. "My whole family does this," Diane Walton Neyhard said recently. "I've done it all my life. … It's a big deal to me and my family." She learned from her grandmother and her kindergarten teacher, both of whom protected and fed caterpillars as they grew into Monarchs. "I have eight brothers and sisters and this is something we all have a heart for," the Colerain Township resident said. Every year, family members gather the Monarch caterpillars and the milkweed they need to survive. While swallowtail butterflies can exist on parsley, dill, fennel, Queen Anne's Lace, and carrots, the Monarchs depend on just one plant - milkweed. "They recommend cutting the milkweed back until the first week in July and then let it grow," she said. That way, fresh, tender leaves will be available when the Monarchs begin to hatch. That's when she heads out, looking for caterpillars in areas that will be cut. Last week, she was working a hayfield, picking the cut milkweed before it could be baled with the alfalfa. She also works the roadbanks, trying to stay a mile ahead of township and state mowers. "I look for milkweed with little perfect circles in the leaves," she said. "When they first hatch, they're clear and hard to see. They only get color as they grow, so you have to look for the circles they've eaten in the leaves." Once a butterfly comes out of its chrysalis, it rests while fluid pumps into its wings, stretching them to full size. When a butterfly is ready to fly, Neyhard moves it outside, usually onto a plant whose nectar can sustain the insect. When it's ready, the butterfly begins its migration. Unless it's too late in the season and cold weather threatens to kill the Monarch before it can head south. That's the when the dedicated take extraordinary measures. "One year, my kindergarten teacher got in touch with a private pilot who was going south and got him to take a Monarch along," she said. She's never put a Monarch on a plane, but she did drive one to northern Maryland. "My last one hatched in November last year. That was too late for it to survive here," she recalled. After failing to get the butterfly a ride on a truck headed south, Neyhard checked the weather map for the closest point where temperatures wouldn't drop below freezing overnight. "That was Whiteford, Md.," she said. So she called a veterinarian she knew there, put the Monarch in her car, and headed south. "It rode on the front seat, sucking hummingbird nectar from a cotton ball, all the way to Whiteford," she said. Every fall, Monarchs migrate from the eastern United States to Mexico and Central America. They spend the winter there, fly to Texas in late winter, breed, and die. The next generation moves north with the flowering of milkweed and repeats the cycle. The third generation reaches the Southern End in late spring. The fourth generation hatches here and prepares to fly south, repeating the cycle. The Monarchs return to the same location every year, even choosing to stay on one side of the road but not the other. "You can see that on Rynear Rd.," Neyhard said. "There's milkweed on both sides, but the Monarchs only use one side. They keep coming back to that side of the road every year." To do that, she revises her work schedule so she can spend three hours a day, every day, collecting and feeding caterpillars and setting butterflies free. "I bring them home, go through them, and put new [milkweed] in to replace the old. I get them in the morning, while they [the milkweeds] have the juices the caterpillars need," she said. Without the milkweed, Monarchs can't exist. "To me, it comes down to changes in society," Neyhard said. "When I was growing up, we didn't spray or cut the roadbanks. When that happens, Monarchs don't have the plant they need to survive, and that's something we can do something about." When the caterpillars begin to spin their chrysalis, the hard shell that protects the insect as it transforms itself into a butterfly. "Once they attach that chrysalis, it can't be moved," she said. When the attachment isn't strong enough, Neyhard has a solution. She threads dental floss through the attaching point and hangs it. "You can't use thread because it's not slick enough," she said. This year, she will tag more than a dozen of the 200 Monarchs she will raise. The tagging is something new for her, Neyhard said. The sheet of tags, a form to list the numbers, and instructions arrived from Kansas last week. "You use a tiny, sticky tag that goes on one wing. Each tag has a number and when that butterfly is found, people can tell where it came from," she said. She also works to spread the word. "I give programs at Amish schools. I bring books [about Monarchs] and they are very receptive," she said. "There's a lot people can do if they do smaller projects locally," she added. "My target is local." Comments are closed.
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