This past weekend I saw an IMAX movie at Science World about the Monarch butterfly migration. It was well done, informative on both the life cycle of the butterflies as well as the lives of the pioneering researching couple and their contribution to track and monitor them. Beautifully shot with images on that huge screen, to immerse the viewer in a sky or forest full of butterflies.
That has renewed my bucket list quest to see it in person. I will see the Monarch migration before I die.
And with our environmental degradation depleting many highly specialized species, I'm running out of time. I don't have another few decades of my lifetime to get around to it eventually - I should go perhaps in the next year or two, or there won't be the massive congregations that make it such a spectacle. From redOrbit.com; "A team of researchers, including experts from the World Wildlife Fund and Mexico's National Commission of Protected Areas found nine hibernating colonies occupied nearly three acres during the winter 2012-13 - a 59 percent decrease from the previous winter. Nearly 20 years ago the colonies covered approximately 45 acres".
So far I know roughly where they're going; their winter Mecca is a protected bio reserve in Mexico so I can avoid following them through the States, and just meet them there. The Monarchs arrive in November and seem to coincide with the Nov 1 Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), so tradition holds that the butterflies are departed souls revisiting loved ones as they flit through the decorated cemetaries. It's a sweet thought, though I'd feel a bit intrusive to partake if I had no specific personal attachment there. From Dec-Jan the butterflies would be dormant in great clusters hanging from the trees, still and eerie. Perhaps the best time would be in March, when the weather warms up and they fill the skies. I hear the sheer volume of that many silent wings in flight sound like light rain.
I would like to tie this into seeing a sea turtle beach hatch baby sea turtles (likely also a dying phenomenon), but that's in the summer, and butterflies are Nov-Mar. So I guess that means I'll have to go to Mexico more than once, oh gee damn...
So that's the plan so far. Now that it's publicly posted I'm putting that out there in the cosmos, the wheels are in motion! Starting now I squirrell away money (moreso than usual?) and save the date. More reseach required.
