Changing and falling leaves are a sure sign of fall, and so are milkweed seed pods starting to dry out in preparation of being harvested. Milkweed is the only host plant of monarch butterflies ...
milkweed, have declined by 90% since 1992. In June 2022, the International Union for Conservation of Nature announced the monarch butterfly had joined the Red List of Threatened Species as ...
Just as the monarch evolved as a milkweed specialist, OE infects only monarchs and a few other butterfly species. Deaths happened around the time the caterpillars were pupating or trying to emerge as ...