‘Where are the monarchs?’ The answer is complicated

By Joy VanderLek Special to The Citizen

“Where are the monarchs?”

It’s been a hot topic of discussion for gardeners and others this summer.

Ron Gagliardi, CT Butterfly Association’s Outreach Educator, saw a monarch in West Haven on Aug. 3, but had not noticed any in Cheshire, where he lives, as of the first week in August.

“That was my first one this season, ” he said.

Monarch populations have been hard hit on both coasts. Myriad sources are responsible, including pesticide use, said Gagliardi. Fragmentation and the resulting lack of host plants and nectar sites normally found in open areas and meadows are also contributing factors.

Gagliardi recalls Xerces Society’s Executive Director Scott Black’s comment on the monarch population's decline, as “death by a thousand cuts.”

“From what I’ve seen, we ’ re seeing a decline in all butterfly populations,” said Gagliardi. He also points to annual studies done by Connecticut lepidopterist Victor Masi in his hometown of Redding. Gagliardi said there was a year when Masi did not record a single monarch.

“They’re being seen – not in big numbers, but both caterpillars and adults are being reported,” said CT Butterfly Association founder John Himmelman. That was back on July 10.

Is it possible that not seeing monarchs locally at this time is just a misperception on the part of the public?

Checking in with CT Agricultural Experiment Station entomologist Dr. Kelsey Fischer, it’s interesting to note that the question of “where are the monarchs?” comes up every year. Fischer has worked with the Eastern subpopulation of monarchs, those east of the Rocky Mountains, since 2016. Their lowest population point was in 2013, she said.

When working in Iowa, and when she was getting her master’s degree in Delaware, Fischer was asked by friends, family and colleagues about monarchs every year. “Now, in Connecticut, the story is no different,” she said. “Every year, without a doubt, I get the question 'where are all the monarchs?'”

Fischer said she never judges how the monarch butterfly population size is doing based on summer observations. “Because the monarch migrates, the monarchs we see in CT are a direct result of earlier generations of monarchs in different parts of the country," she said. “Monarchs could be anywhere. Check out the