August 29, 2025 • 31 mins
In this episode of the Good Growing Podcast, horticulture educator Chris Enroth from University of Illinois Extension explores the adversaries of the monarch butterfly, including the controversial practice of captive rearing.
Although we do not recommend captive rearing, there may be times when it is wanted for educational purposes. Can it be done responsibly? Chris shares best practices for raising monarch caterpillars indoors. Instead of captive rearing, support habitat conservation efforts! Learn how programs like Monarch Waystations and pollinator gardens can help restore critical habitat.
Watch us on YouTube https://youtu.be/Yfzxnvpco0M
00:32 The dangers encountered by monarch butterflies
02:07 Predators!
02:17 Disease!
03:18 A historic shift in habitat for monarch butterflies
04:04 Introducing the concept of captive rearing of monarch butterflies
07:17 Why captive rearing is not recommended
07:27 A loss of fitness
09:21 Artificially overpopulating an area with monarch butterflies
10:38 If you are STILL going to captive rear monarch butterflies, here are some tips.
11:44 What to feed your monarch caterpillars (cats)
14:21 What type of container to use
14:57 Placement of rearing cage
15:14 Check and clean containers daily
15:42 The stages (instars) of the caterpillar
16:11 The walkabout and final molt into a chrysalis
18:19 Emergence of the adult butterfly from the chrysalis
18:51 Releasing the adult
19:00 Not everything works out with the rearing process
19:19 Don't handle monarch caterpillars
19:51 How many caterpillars are responsible for rearing?
21:53 If captive rearing is discouraged, what can be done to help monarch butterflies?
23:49 efforts to support monarch butterfly habitat
24:32 Monarch Waystation Program
29:15 Upcoming Monarch Migration Festival. Thank you and see you next week!
Monarch Migration Festival, Sept 6, 2025 https://extension.illinois.edu/events/2025-09-06-11th-annual-monarch-migration-festival
Xerces Society Keep Monarchs Wild https://www.xerces.org/blog/keep-monarchs-wild
Monarch Butterfly Science w/ Dr. Andy Davis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIt-zkivDjI
Monarch Butterfly Status Update w/ Brodie Dunn https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmqQlyPY1TA
University of Illinois Extension Pollinator Pockets https://extension.illinois.edu/cfiv/pollinator-pockets
University of Illinois Extension Pollinator Website https://illinoispollinators.org/
Contact us!
Chris Enroth: cenroth@illinois.edu
Ken Johnson: kjohnso@illinois.edu
Check out the Good Growing Blog: https://go.illinois.edu/goodgrowing
Subscribe to the weekly Good Growing email: https://go.illinois.edu/goodgrowingsubscribe
Any products or companies mentioned during the podcast are in no way a promotion or endorsement of these products or companies.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Chris (00:05):
Welcome to the Good Growing podcast. I am Chris
Enroth, horticulture educatorwith the University of Illinois
Extension coming at you fromMacomb, Illinois. Monarch
butterflies. Population decline?Should we help them by rearing
them indoors?
How do you rear them indoorsresponsibly? These are the
things that will be discussedbriefly today and we have a lot
(00:28):
more information for you in theshow notes if you wanna dig a
little bit further. But I wouldsay when it comes to monarch
butterflies, really butterfliesin general, they make us happy.
We love seeing butterflies. Andmonarchs being so recognizable,
they are present across most ofNorth America, it is something
that is a shared bond orrelationship with all of us here
(00:52):
on the continent.
And it's something especially itis the time of year, as we are
late in the season here, let'ssay we're being recorded August
27. I am doing a lot oftraveling, whether it's for work
or for kids sports, but I see alot of monarch butterflies in
the distance and every so oftenI see one right in front of the
(01:16):
windshield. So this is the timeI'm also cringing a lot as I
hold onto the steering wheelknowing I just hit a butterfly.
So I would say mother nature hasdesigned for a lot in the world,
but I don't think she could haveforeseen the implications of the
automobile. In addition to cars,monarch butterflies face all
(01:37):
manner of adversity.
So as they try to go from egg tocaterpillar to butterfly, there
are all kinds of things thatwant to eat them, infect them,
parasitize them, and eat themfrom the inside out, and then
all of the other things that canoccur to them, just
environmental or unforeseen orhuman caused actions. In the
(02:02):
past I have seen monarchcaterpillars picked up off of
milkweed by yellowjackets, havewatched them munched on by
praying mantis, but one of themore notorious diseases that
they face is one known asOphreocitis electroscira, which,
as a mouthful, we call that OEfor short. OE is a protozoan
(02:25):
parasite. It needs a monarchbutterfly to spread and move
around the environment, But inreturn, this one celled
organism, a protozoan, will killthe monarch butterfly. So I
don't think it seems quite likea fair trade.
And monarch problems, they gobeyond the things that nature
throws at it in terms ofpredators, parasites, and
(02:48):
disease, and my minivan. There'salso clean farming practices,
clean landscaping practiceswhere we must have a tidy
landscape where we often wind uplimiting the amount of weeds,
one of these being milkweed,which is the only thing a
monarch caterpillar will eat,and then nectar sources for
(03:11):
adult butterflies. And I wouldsay that last one is definitely
a critical thing that we'llprobably get into here in just a
bit. When we look at the monarchbutterfly habitat that used to
exist here, especially inIllinois, we know that about 90%
of that habitat has been flippedinto agricultural production.
(03:32):
The urban environment is notvery hospitable either, where we
have gone from potentiallyprairie or woodland timber into
large expanses of concrete,building structures, and lots of
turf grass, which provides verylittle habitat unless you are a,
I guess, a car or a golfer.
(03:54):
And of course, there's the everpresent implications of climate
change which is having an impacton monarch butterflies. It seems
as though everything is just atodds with the survival of the
monarch butterfly. In fact, thatsurvival rate in some cases is
less than one percent in orderto get that that insect from an
(04:16):
egg all the way up to a breedingadult. So how could we change
that? Or maybe a differentquestion is how should we be
trying to change that?
So this is when the idea ofraising or rearing monarchs
indoors comes to light becausewe think, well, maybe we could
(04:38):
take that one percent survivalrate and flip that to a ninety
nine percent survival rate if wewould take them from the
milkweed plant outside and bringthem indoors. It's not a crazy
notion. We do wild or captiverearing for a lot of other
endangered species out there.Now monarchs are not endangered
species, at least not right now.But when those captive rearing
(05:02):
projects are ongoing, they arevery selective in what animals
they are choosing, how they arerecording the data, and it is a
very controlled environment interms of making sure that this
animal is not becoming tooacclimated perhaps to humans.
Now there are also other insectsand butterflies out there that
are also being captive rearedfor the preservation of their
(05:24):
species. But those are veryoften instances where that
insect or that animal is alocalized species. It only
occurs in this specific area.When we talk monarch
butterflies, again, as wementioned at the top of the show
here, we are talking about aninsect that covers the entirety
of North America. Chances areyou know someone or your kids or
(05:46):
grandkids have already beendoing something like this in
school.
I know in years past, my kids,they had experienced indoor
monarch rearing in theirkindergarten classrooms. I think
it was a pretty good experiencein terms of teaching them the
insect life cycle, showing themhow things change from egg to
(06:09):
larva to adult, and then showingjust, you know, the appreciation
that we can have for the smalleranimals of this world, and that
everyone has its place or itspart. And I think it also does a
great job of showing that thereare specific relationships that
happen in nature. For instance,the monarch female, she will
(06:31):
only lay her eggs on themilkweed. Monarch caterpillar
has evolved and adapted toeating milkweed, which does
exude a milky white substancethat can be toxic to some, but
it has evolved the ability tomunch on that leaf without
triggering that milky whitesubstance.
And so I think it just shows andit's a great teachable moment
(06:54):
where they can take that andhopefully apply that to
everything else that happens innature around them. However,
there is still a growing body ofevidence in the scientific
community showing that theindoor raising or captive
rearing, as it's also called, ofmonarch butterflies is
(07:14):
potentially detrimental to thewild population. So let's touch
on some of those reasons why wewould perhaps not want to be
captive rearing our monarchbutterflies. I'd say one of the
main reasons that I see in thebiology world in terms of
captive rearing and why it mighthave negative consequences is
(07:36):
that it's the idea of fitness.It is a very human thing to take
a wild animal that we couldpotentially save and nurture and
raise and then release it backout into the wild.
However, there is this idea thatcaterpillars are soft bodied
(07:58):
insects. And as we've mentionedbefore, there's a lot of things
that eat caterpillars, there'slot of things that eat monarch
caterpillars. Even though theymight not be as tasty to some
animals, they are tasty to a fewanimals out there. And so they
are supposed to be food. That 1%survival rate has likely been
(08:21):
designed or bred or evolved intothat natural selection process.
And so it is saying that themost fit caterpillar is the one
is the one that that can, shouldbe making it to adulthood. Are
monarch caterpillars fighters?Well, kind of. They can kind of
(08:47):
jerk or move their head whencertain predators come near, how
they position themselves on themilkweed to be more of a
defensive or more of acamouflage position is
important. And so there arethese fitness things.
And then of course there's thedisease. And so if we are
pulling these caterpillars outof the wild that are more
(09:08):
susceptible to disease and thenthey pass those genetics on to
future generations, we are nowbuilding in a more higher
susceptibility to potentialdiseases like OE in the
caterpillar populations. Anotherconcern that does come up is
that because some caterpillarsare not supposed to make it in
(09:28):
the wild, If we do artificiallyinflate that population, do we
have the resources to supportthat higher population level?
And so this means that if we'rekeeping higher densities in the
wild, do we have the milkweed tosustain them? Do we have the
(09:48):
nectar sources to keep themgoing?
And if there are more of them,if they are at higher densities,
is the chances of disease goingto increase for them? If you are
saying, well, you know what, Idon't know if I buy into this,
there seems like more reasonswhy we should be captive free
(10:09):
monarchs than that, well, weactually have an episode where
we really dive into this topicwith Doctor. Andy Davis with the
University of Georgia whostudies this topic. We will
leave a link to that one in theshow notes down below if you
want to learn more about this.And also, this is something that
is being advocated more by otherorganizations, say, like Xerxes
(10:32):
Society, that we will also leavelinks to their articles down
below as well.
This next part, I'm debatingwhether or not I'm going to
leave it into the episode, but Ifigured you might be watching
this still like, well, I to reara couple monarchs, maybe I want
(10:53):
to tag them for scientificpurposes, maybe I want to be
able to show this to classroomof kids. And so I get it. You
are looking for thatinformation. There are
procedures that you can do thismore responsibly. Again,
definitely not advocating forthe raising of hundreds,
(11:14):
hundreds or thousands of monarchcaterpillars, we cannot save
them by raising them indoors.
We'll talk about other optionshere in a bit. So but if you are
interested in captive rearedmonarch butterflies with
caterpillars really, here aresome tips, maybe a procedure
that you can go by that can helpyou be more successful and
(11:37):
hopefully limit the spread ofdisease which is one of the big
concerns that we do have withcaptive rearing. So let's get
started. Monarch caterpillarsonly eat milkweed. Now I think a
lot of folks are familiar withcommon milkweed.
It is found all across Illinoisand across the Midwest. There is
(12:00):
definitely that. But there aremore than two dozen species of
milkweed native to Illinois. Sothere's many different types. I
would say late in the season Ifind a lot of monarch
caterpillars on my swampmilkweed.
Swamp milkweed has very narrowleaves, it might be more
difficult to keep that in stockbecause swamp milkweed, at least
(12:20):
this time of the year, is reallystarting to decline, whereas
common milkweed, it still has afew more weeks left in it. And
so I would say if you'rescouting, scout around for
common milkweed. It's Asclepiscerecia and or cirica, as Ken
and I have debated on this show.And so just I would say scout
(12:45):
around for that, those areusually a bit more long lasting,
or butterfly weed is the orangeflowering one, that's another
one that might last a little bitlonger. And the other thing is
that what I typically see isthat whatever species that
monarch female has later egg onand that caterpillar has hatched
and has started eating, itreally just tends to stick to
(13:06):
that species.
I have pulled out honey vinemilkweed that has had monarch
caterpillars on it and I'veactually closed pinned it to my
swamp milkweed. They didn't goto it. They just seem to refuse
to jump from the honey vine weedover the swamp milkweed. I'm not
sure why, I'm sure someone outthere has a better explanation
than mine which is I don't know,they just don't like it. So
(13:28):
alright, so you have yourmilkweed, you're scouting for
them, you find a caterpillar,bring that inside.
The thing about feeding them,think is the other important
thing is as you're pullingleaves off the milkweed plants,
want them to be think of it aslettuce. You know, what would
you eat? And so the smaller,tender leaves, they're probably
(13:51):
those more choice that acaterpillar would prefer to eat,
and also layer eggs, and sothose are ones to scout and to
bring inside. Wash it before youbring it to feed your
caterpillars, but before washingit, make sure that you don't
spot any other eggs or any otherinsects on there that you might
(14:12):
be washing off. Remembermilkweed plants are a whole
world of diverse amount ofinsect species and other things
that are living on it.
In terms of containers, I thinkyou can transition containers
when you first bring them in.You can have a smaller
container. Plastic works well inthis case because it is
something that you can sanitizeto limit that disease spread.
(14:36):
You'll want to keep a wet papertowel on the bottom where you
keep your that will help keepyour milkweed leaf hydrated. And
the smaller container helps youkeep track of caterpillars, it
just makes it easier to see themand find them.
And you can transition up tolarger containers as they get
bigger and you might need moreand more milkweed plants to keep
them going. Another importantthing is about where you place
(15:00):
your rearing cage is thattemperature affects everything
in this process, and so thewarmer the temperature, the
faster the egg or caterpillar orpupa will develop into an adult
butterfly. You're going to wantto check and clean those
containers daily. You know,first, you know, we're kind of
(15:21):
also thinking about thecaterpillar poop or the fancy
word for this is frass that theywill generate. And as they're
small caterpillars, the frass isgoing to be like pepper flakes
or something.
But as they get bigger they aregoing to be much larger chunks
of frass and so you're going towant to clean those out every
(15:42):
single day. Every caterpillar isgoing to molt. This means the
process that happens is thatthey usually become very still
for a period of time. Kids inthe classroom also say, oh,
something's wrong with thecaterpillar, it's not eating,
it's not moving. What might behappening right then is that it
might be molting.
And what it does, it puts down alittle silk pad, anchors it, and
(16:03):
then it will split out of itsskin and it'll crawl out and it
will leave its skin behind. Andsometimes it might even eat its
own skin. So the last time thecaterpillar molts is when it
will form its J and form thatchrysalis. And as it gets ready
for that last molt, it's goingto do a walkabout. Essentially
(16:24):
what this is, is it's thecaterpillar's strategy to get it
off of that milkweed plant andget it somewhere maybe more
sheltered, maybe a bit more safewhere it can go into its pupil
case or its chrysalis and thenspend a week or two in that case
and then develop into that adultbutterfly.
So it will want to leave themilkweed plant, it'll want to
(16:48):
leave and that's why we oftenwill find those chrysalis
hanging in odd or awkward spotsin the cage and sometimes if it
escapes, in odd and awkwardspots around the house or
classroom. This is whentransitioning maybe to a taller
container might be best. So onceit finds its ideal spot, it will
put down its silk button and itwill put its feet into that
(17:10):
button and then it will hangfrom that position in a J, like
a capital J shape. And it mighthang like that for eighteen
hours or longer. You will then,after it hangs there and it
determines that it is ready tomake that final molt, it's going
(17:30):
to straighten out and it's goingto do what's kind of termed the
pupa dance.
It's going to wiggle around andthat means that wiggling is the
splitting open of its skin forone last time, it'll wiggle out
of it and it will form thatchrysalis around it. And you
know this kind of amazing partof metamorphosis here is that it
(17:51):
sort of just liquefies and itlooks nothing like a
caterpillar, looks nothing likea butterfly. It is the in
between that it is in right thenand there. The chrysalis will
hang in this position in itschrysalis for anywhere from
eight to twelve days. Once yousee it start to turn dark,
black, you start seeing maybethe colors of those wings behind
(18:14):
that chrysalis case, this is asignal that you are about to
have an adult monarch butterfly.
Once the adult butterfly emergesor ecloses, it will hang there
for a period of time, it's goingto dry its wings and it's going
to pump the fluid that's in itsbody into its wings. It's going
to look kind of deflated at Andit's going to spend several
(18:34):
hours doing this. And generally,after eclosing, the adult
butterfly will not eat for abouttwenty four hours. It'll just
hang out there, getting readyfor its journey and if this is
the migration generation, it isgetting ready for a very long
journey indeed. So only releaseyour adult back out into the
(18:54):
wild making sure that it is arain free day and ideally when
temperatures are above 55degrees Fahrenheit.
And keep in mind as you areraising monarch caterpillars,
things are going to happen thatwill lead to its death. There
might be parasites in it, theremight be disease, I have seen on
instance where milkweed has beensprayed with an insecticide on
(19:15):
accident, and all other kinds ofunexplained things. Another big
thing is avoid handling thecaterpillar. You don't want to
pick it up and move it aroundwhen you move it, you want to
make sure that you're picking itup on whatever leaf or stem that
it is on and moving it that way.If it has, say, getting ready to
(19:36):
molt and put its silk pad down,you might injure it or
potentially kill it by pickingup that caterpillar and moving
around.
So make sure that you're nevermoving or handling that
caterpillar wherever it isresting. Now, how many
caterpillars could you, shouldyou, would you want to rear
(19:56):
indoors that would still beresponsible? Well, Xerxes
Society says no more than 10.But if you're doing that, 10
extra butterflies in the monarchpopulation is not going to make
much of a difference. However,there are many more people doing
(20:16):
this across North America inclassrooms, at home.
There's even companies that aredoing this. And so when we
factor this out, you know, oneperson who is raising 10, not as
much, but if you get a millionpeople raising 10, well that
starts to become a majorcontributor to the population
(20:39):
genetics occurring in themonarch, but wild monarch
butterflies. And so I wouldsuggest or recommend that if
this is something that interestsyou, limit your number to 10. If
you could hold off doing this,maybe participate, maybe use
your rearing as part of aclassroom. You can bring it into
(21:02):
a classroom.
That way the classroom, theydon't have to rear their own
monarch butterflies.Essentially, we're trying to
reduce this number so that we'renot being oh, contributing what
might be a lack of fitness intothe wild monarch population.
Well, alright, I have maybe comedown pretty hard on those who
like to rear monarchbutterflies, and I will say I've
(21:24):
done this myself. We have hadsuccesses at home, we have had
failures, I have watched fliesemerge from monarch butterflies
as parasites. Has been a it hasbeen a great learning
experience, I'll say that.
And my kids might always bescarred for life watching those
little fly larvae crawl theirway out of the monarch butterfly
(21:49):
caterpillar. But so if I've comedown hard and you're saying well
what can we do? I'd say of allthe the research papers and all
the things that I've read aboutmonarch butterflies and the
things, the problems they have,the things that are, you know,
affecting their population,whether it's disease, predators,
(22:12):
parasites, pesticides, climatechange, You know, these research
papers, you know, they try toquantify and indicate these
particular things, but it'salmost every single research
paper. If you just go all theway to the end, that conclusion
section, they all say, yes,whatever it is we were studying,
it might, is, could be, or isn'tpotential factor in monarch
(22:37):
decline, but they all say thenumber one contributor to
monarch butterfly decline ishabitat. There's just not enough
of it.
And when we look at thepopulations that occur in
Illinois, we actually see arebound effect in the summer
months here. So it seems asthough the population levels are
(23:01):
able to push back to where theywere the year before. So what is
it that might potentially beaffecting that overall
population? Well, we lookspecifically at that migration
generation, moving from some allthe way up into Canada all the
way down to Mexico. And the lackof nectar sources, floral
(23:25):
resources for these butterfliesto have fuel and energy to get
them to where they need to be tooverwinter down in Mexico.
That is a major contributor tothe decline of the monarch
butterfly population. And it'sthe one of the major concerns,
it's habitat. Habitat loss. Sowhat can we do to support
(23:49):
monarch habitat? Well, I mean,volunteer local conservation
groups.
Illinois Extension has a MasterNaturalist program that is just
conservation volunteers, we goout and educate folks about
wildlife, plants, animals, allthat stuff that happens in
nature around us. Support localland preservation, you know,
(24:14):
community pollinator projects.These are all ways to do this.
And I do have one idea, onething that we have been doing
actually here in WesternIllinois locally, which has
seemed to prove some results.And I want to talk about a
program that you couldpotentially enroll in, that is
the Monarch Waystation program.
(24:35):
Monarch Waystation programstarted at University of Kansas.
Chip Taylor began this programwhere you could certify a piece
of property as a MonarchWaystation. So a waystation
would be like a garden, it couldbe as small as a couple
containers, there's no reallyminimum size here. It could be a
(24:59):
garden size, pollinator backyardsize, it could be a prairie. But
what it is is just getting dotson the map.
Where are we creating habitat inNorth America? And what this
habitat provides is that larvalfood source for the caterpillar
and a nectar source for theadult butterfly, especially food
(25:20):
sources for that migrationgeneration. I believe you can go
online, we'll leave links to theweigh station program down
below. Now there's all differenttypes of programs as well.
That's what originated inKansas, it is now kind of more
of a nationwide program.
University of IllinoisExtension, we have our own, we
have our pollinator pocketsprogram, we have our
(25:42):
conservation home program, wehave a lot of habitat programs
that you can even do here withour organization. But I like
this waste station programbecause a long time ago, I would
say maybe twelve years ago, someof our Master Gardener
volunteers and I, we gottogether and we said, well how
(26:02):
can we measure that we're makingan impact with our monarch
butterfly education? And so Isaid, well if we can tell people
about monarch butterfly, how wecan provide habitat for our
wildlife and get them to sign upas a Monarch Waystation, then
that is data that shows thatwe're having effect. You can
(26:25):
actually go on the waystationwebsite and there's a database
of where these weigh stationsare located in the country. And
so when we draw like a radiuscircle around our neck of the
woods, and after a few years ofdoing this effort, we can see a
significant increase in MonarchWay stations in our part of the
(26:46):
state of Illinois, which I go tosay that that means that we are
having an impact.
Now, there's nothing better thana little bit of competition, I
would say, when it comes toanything human related, right?
And so our goal with, you know,you know, kind of our volunteer
(27:07):
goal, our Master Gardeners andnow Master Naturalists program,
which has sprung up since then,our goal is to make our part of
Illinois and then Illinois thestate the Monarch Waystation
capital. And so here's where thenumbers stand right now. There
are currently 52,932 MonarchWaystation habitats as of
(27:30):
08/15/2025. That is nationwide,that is across the country, and
there's even a few in Australiaas well.
Now, when we break this out bystate, we Illinois is in second
place. The first place is Texaswith 4,271 way stations. But
(27:53):
Illinois, we have only we arecurrently at 4,078 way stations.
We have like 200 way stations togo and we can overtake Texas and
be in the lead. So come on,Illinois.
If you are in Illinois oranywhere in the country, but
Illinois, I mean, come on, I gotthis little competitive spirit
(28:14):
here. If we can get 200 moreweigh stations registered out
there, if you have milkweed, ifyou have nectar sources, if you
are stewarding the landscape formonarchs, for other wild native
insects, for birds, reptiles,mammals, any of that. It all
contributes to that. Registerfor that Monarch Waystation. It
(28:35):
does cost $18 processing fee,and if you want to pay double
that $36 they will send you analuminum sign as well.
You will get a specific number,you'll appear on their registry,
and you can put up that aluminumsign, which generates
conversation with other peoplein the community. People see
(28:55):
that, they say, oh, well that'swhat we can, something we could
do to help in conservation. Andit just gets people talking, it
gets the conversation startedabout habitat conservation and
how we can incorporate that intoour agricultural and our
landscape lands that we live,work, and play in. Well, was a
(29:16):
lot of great information aboutmonarch butterflies, everything
from their adversities that theyencounter to tips for rearing
them, which again, I don'treally recommend we do that.
Maybe save those for specialoccasions, special events.
And if you are going to do that,make sure that you do only 10 or
(29:38):
less than that. And so, yeah,restrain yourself. And actually,
coming up, we have an event thatwe do every year in Galesburg.
It is called the MonarchMigration Festival. It happens
it always happens the Saturdayafter Labor Day.
This year, is September 6. Itwill be in the morning. It's
going to be at Galesburg NatureCenter in Galesburg, Illinois.
(30:01):
And this is essentially where wejust get together. We have
education stations.
There's a few vendors. We gotmusic. We got stories, and yes,
we will even release some taggedcaptive reared monarch
butterflies. And so we're justgetting together to sort of
celebrate, it's the end of theseason, It's the end of the
(30:22):
growing season. The monarchbutterflies are migrating south,
and it's it is a celebration ofthat.
And so, hey, come check us out.If you can't make it this year,
again, we're there every year.The first Saturday or this is
Saturday after Labor Day inGalesburg, Illinois. It is a fun
time and people come from allover to attend. Well, the Good
Growing podcast is a productionof University of Illinois
Extension, edited this week byme, Chris Enroth.
(30:44):
Hey, listeners. Thank you fordoing what you do best and that
is listening. Or if you watchedus on YouTube, watching. And as
always, keep on growing. Hey, Abig thanks for you.
(31:07):
Thank you for doing what you dodo do. You do do best. What you
do do best.
Welcome to the Good Growing podcast. I am Chris
Enroth, horticulture educatorwith the University of Illinois
Extension coming at you fromMacomb, Illinois. Monarch
butterflies. Population decline?Should we help them by rearing
them indoors?
How do you rear them indoorsresponsibly? These are the
things that will be discussedbriefly today and we have a lot
(00:28):
more information for you in theshow notes if you wanna dig a
little bit further. But I wouldsay when it comes to monarch
butterflies, really butterfliesin general, they make us happy.
We love seeing butterflies. Andmonarchs being so recognizable,
they are present across most ofNorth America, it is something
that is a shared bond orrelationship with all of us here
(00:52):
on the continent.
And it's something especially itis the time of year, as we are
late in the season here, let'ssay we're being recorded August
27. I am doing a lot oftraveling, whether it's for work
or for kids sports, but I see alot of monarch butterflies in
the distance and every so oftenI see one right in front of the
(01:16):
windshield. So this is the timeI'm also cringing a lot as I
hold onto the steering wheelknowing I just hit a butterfly.
So I would say mother nature hasdesigned for a lot in the world,
but I don't think she could haveforeseen the implications of the
automobile. In addition to cars,monarch butterflies face all
(01:37):
manner of adversity.
So as they try to go from egg tocaterpillar to butterfly, there
are all kinds of things thatwant to eat them, infect them,
parasitize them, and eat themfrom the inside out, and then
all of the other things that canoccur to them, just
environmental or unforeseen orhuman caused actions. In the
(02:02):
past I have seen monarchcaterpillars picked up off of
milkweed by yellowjackets, havewatched them munched on by
praying mantis, but one of themore notorious diseases that
they face is one known asOphreocitis electroscira, which,
as a mouthful, we call that OEfor short. OE is a protozoan
(02:25):
parasite. It needs a monarchbutterfly to spread and move
around the environment, But inreturn, this one celled
organism, a protozoan, will killthe monarch butterfly. So I
don't think it seems quite likea fair trade.
And monarch problems, they gobeyond the things that nature
throws at it in terms ofpredators, parasites, and
(02:48):
disease, and my minivan. There'salso clean farming practices,
clean landscaping practiceswhere we must have a tidy
landscape where we often wind uplimiting the amount of weeds,
one of these being milkweed,which is the only thing a
monarch caterpillar will eat,and then nectar sources for
(03:11):
adult butterflies. And I wouldsay that last one is definitely
a critical thing that we'llprobably get into here in just a
bit. When we look at the monarchbutterfly habitat that used to
exist here, especially inIllinois, we know that about 90%
of that habitat has been flippedinto agricultural production.
(03:32):
The urban environment is notvery hospitable either, where we
have gone from potentiallyprairie or woodland timber into
large expanses of concrete,building structures, and lots of
turf grass, which provides verylittle habitat unless you are a,
I guess, a car or a golfer.
(03:54):
And of course, there's the everpresent implications of climate
change which is having an impacton monarch butterflies. It seems
as though everything is just atodds with the survival of the
monarch butterfly. In fact, thatsurvival rate in some cases is
less than one percent in orderto get that that insect from an
(04:16):
egg all the way up to a breedingadult. So how could we change
that? Or maybe a differentquestion is how should we be
trying to change that?
So this is when the idea ofraising or rearing monarchs
indoors comes to light becausewe think, well, maybe we could
(04:38):
take that one percent survivalrate and flip that to a ninety
nine percent survival rate if wewould take them from the
milkweed plant outside and bringthem indoors. It's not a crazy
notion. We do wild or captiverearing for a lot of other
endangered species out there.Now monarchs are not endangered
species, at least not right now.But when those captive rearing
(05:02):
projects are ongoing, they arevery selective in what animals
they are choosing, how they arerecording the data, and it is a
very controlled environment interms of making sure that this
animal is not becoming tooacclimated perhaps to humans.
Now there are also other insectsand butterflies out there that
are also being captive rearedfor the preservation of their
(05:24):
species. But those are veryoften instances where that
insect or that animal is alocalized species. It only
occurs in this specific area.When we talk monarch
butterflies, again, as wementioned at the top of the show
here, we are talking about aninsect that covers the entirety
of North America. Chances areyou know someone or your kids or
(05:46):
grandkids have already beendoing something like this in
school.
I know in years past, my kids,they had experienced indoor
monarch rearing in theirkindergarten classrooms. I think
it was a pretty good experiencein terms of teaching them the
insect life cycle, showing themhow things change from egg to
(06:09):
larva to adult, and then showingjust, you know, the appreciation
that we can have for the smalleranimals of this world, and that
everyone has its place or itspart. And I think it also does a
great job of showing that thereare specific relationships that
happen in nature. For instance,the monarch female, she will
(06:31):
only lay her eggs on themilkweed. Monarch caterpillar
has evolved and adapted toeating milkweed, which does
exude a milky white substancethat can be toxic to some, but
it has evolved the ability tomunch on that leaf without
triggering that milky whitesubstance.
And so I think it just shows andit's a great teachable moment
(06:54):
where they can take that andhopefully apply that to
everything else that happens innature around them. However,
there is still a growing body ofevidence in the scientific
community showing that theindoor raising or captive
rearing, as it's also called, ofmonarch butterflies is
(07:14):
potentially detrimental to thewild population. So let's touch
on some of those reasons why wewould perhaps not want to be
captive rearing our monarchbutterflies. I'd say one of the
main reasons that I see in thebiology world in terms of
captive rearing and why it mighthave negative consequences is
(07:36):
that it's the idea of fitness.It is a very human thing to take
a wild animal that we couldpotentially save and nurture and
raise and then release it backout into the wild.
However, there is this idea thatcaterpillars are soft bodied
(07:58):
insects. And as we've mentionedbefore, there's a lot of things
that eat caterpillars, there'slot of things that eat monarch
caterpillars. Even though theymight not be as tasty to some
animals, they are tasty to a fewanimals out there. And so they
are supposed to be food. That 1%survival rate has likely been
(08:21):
designed or bred or evolved intothat natural selection process.
And so it is saying that themost fit caterpillar is the one
is the one that that can, shouldbe making it to adulthood. Are
monarch caterpillars fighters?Well, kind of. They can kind of
(08:47):
jerk or move their head whencertain predators come near, how
they position themselves on themilkweed to be more of a
defensive or more of acamouflage position is
important. And so there arethese fitness things.
And then of course there's thedisease. And so if we are
pulling these caterpillars outof the wild that are more
(09:08):
susceptible to disease and thenthey pass those genetics on to
future generations, we are nowbuilding in a more higher
susceptibility to potentialdiseases like OE in the
caterpillar populations. Anotherconcern that does come up is
that because some caterpillarsare not supposed to make it in
(09:28):
the wild, If we do artificiallyinflate that population, do we
have the resources to supportthat higher population level?
And so this means that if we'rekeeping higher densities in the
wild, do we have the milkweed tosustain them? Do we have the
(09:48):
nectar sources to keep themgoing?
And if there are more of them,if they are at higher densities,
is the chances of disease goingto increase for them? If you are
saying, well, you know what, Idon't know if I buy into this,
there seems like more reasonswhy we should be captive free
(10:09):
monarchs than that, well, weactually have an episode where
we really dive into this topicwith Doctor. Andy Davis with the
University of Georgia whostudies this topic. We will
leave a link to that one in theshow notes down below if you
want to learn more about this.And also, this is something that
is being advocated more by otherorganizations, say, like Xerxes
(10:32):
Society, that we will also leavelinks to their articles down
below as well.
This next part, I'm debatingwhether or not I'm going to
leave it into the episode, but Ifigured you might be watching
this still like, well, I to reara couple monarchs, maybe I want
(10:53):
to tag them for scientificpurposes, maybe I want to be
able to show this to classroomof kids. And so I get it. You
are looking for thatinformation. There are
procedures that you can do thismore responsibly. Again,
definitely not advocating forthe raising of hundreds,
(11:14):
hundreds or thousands of monarchcaterpillars, we cannot save
them by raising them indoors.
We'll talk about other optionshere in a bit. So but if you are
interested in captive rearedmonarch butterflies with
caterpillars really, here aresome tips, maybe a procedure
that you can go by that can helpyou be more successful and
(11:37):
hopefully limit the spread ofdisease which is one of the big
concerns that we do have withcaptive rearing. So let's get
started. Monarch caterpillarsonly eat milkweed. Now I think a
lot of folks are familiar withcommon milkweed.
It is found all across Illinoisand across the Midwest. There is
(12:00):
definitely that. But there aremore than two dozen species of
milkweed native to Illinois. Sothere's many different types. I
would say late in the season Ifind a lot of monarch
caterpillars on my swampmilkweed.
Swamp milkweed has very narrowleaves, it might be more
difficult to keep that in stockbecause swamp milkweed, at least
(12:20):
this time of the year, is reallystarting to decline, whereas
common milkweed, it still has afew more weeks left in it. And
so I would say if you'rescouting, scout around for
common milkweed. It's Asclepiscerecia and or cirica, as Ken
and I have debated on this show.And so just I would say scout
(12:45):
around for that, those areusually a bit more long lasting,
or butterfly weed is the orangeflowering one, that's another
one that might last a little bitlonger. And the other thing is
that what I typically see isthat whatever species that
monarch female has later egg onand that caterpillar has hatched
and has started eating, itreally just tends to stick to
(13:06):
that species.
I have pulled out honey vinemilkweed that has had monarch
caterpillars on it and I'veactually closed pinned it to my
swamp milkweed. They didn't goto it. They just seem to refuse
to jump from the honey vine weedover the swamp milkweed. I'm not
sure why, I'm sure someone outthere has a better explanation
than mine which is I don't know,they just don't like it. So
(13:28):
alright, so you have yourmilkweed, you're scouting for
them, you find a caterpillar,bring that inside.
The thing about feeding them,think is the other important
thing is as you're pullingleaves off the milkweed plants,
want them to be think of it aslettuce. You know, what would
you eat? And so the smaller,tender leaves, they're probably
(13:51):
those more choice that acaterpillar would prefer to eat,
and also layer eggs, and sothose are ones to scout and to
bring inside. Wash it before youbring it to feed your
caterpillars, but before washingit, make sure that you don't
spot any other eggs or any otherinsects on there that you might
(14:12):
be washing off. Remembermilkweed plants are a whole
world of diverse amount ofinsect species and other things
that are living on it.
In terms of containers, I thinkyou can transition containers
when you first bring them in.You can have a smaller
container. Plastic works well inthis case because it is
something that you can sanitizeto limit that disease spread.
(14:36):
You'll want to keep a wet papertowel on the bottom where you
keep your that will help keepyour milkweed leaf hydrated. And
the smaller container helps youkeep track of caterpillars, it
just makes it easier to see themand find them.
And you can transition up tolarger containers as they get
bigger and you might need moreand more milkweed plants to keep
them going. Another importantthing is about where you place
(15:00):
your rearing cage is thattemperature affects everything
in this process, and so thewarmer the temperature, the
faster the egg or caterpillar orpupa will develop into an adult
butterfly. You're going to wantto check and clean those
containers daily. You know,first, you know, we're kind of
(15:21):
also thinking about thecaterpillar poop or the fancy
word for this is frass that theywill generate. And as they're
small caterpillars, the frass isgoing to be like pepper flakes
or something.
But as they get bigger they aregoing to be much larger chunks
of frass and so you're going towant to clean those out every
(15:42):
single day. Every caterpillar isgoing to molt. This means the
process that happens is thatthey usually become very still
for a period of time. Kids inthe classroom also say, oh,
something's wrong with thecaterpillar, it's not eating,
it's not moving. What might behappening right then is that it
might be molting.
And what it does, it puts down alittle silk pad, anchors it, and
(16:03):
then it will split out of itsskin and it'll crawl out and it
will leave its skin behind. Andsometimes it might even eat its
own skin. So the last time thecaterpillar molts is when it
will form its J and form thatchrysalis. And as it gets ready
for that last molt, it's goingto do a walkabout. Essentially
(16:24):
what this is, is it's thecaterpillar's strategy to get it
off of that milkweed plant andget it somewhere maybe more
sheltered, maybe a bit more safewhere it can go into its pupil
case or its chrysalis and thenspend a week or two in that case
and then develop into that adultbutterfly.
So it will want to leave themilkweed plant, it'll want to
(16:48):
leave and that's why we oftenwill find those chrysalis
hanging in odd or awkward spotsin the cage and sometimes if it
escapes, in odd and awkwardspots around the house or
classroom. This is whentransitioning maybe to a taller
container might be best. So onceit finds its ideal spot, it will
put down its silk button and itwill put its feet into that
(17:10):
button and then it will hangfrom that position in a J, like
a capital J shape. And it mighthang like that for eighteen
hours or longer. You will then,after it hangs there and it
determines that it is ready tomake that final molt, it's going
(17:30):
to straighten out and it's goingto do what's kind of termed the
pupa dance.
It's going to wiggle around andthat means that wiggling is the
splitting open of its skin forone last time, it'll wiggle out
of it and it will form thatchrysalis around it. And you
know this kind of amazing partof metamorphosis here is that it
(17:51):
sort of just liquefies and itlooks nothing like a
caterpillar, looks nothing likea butterfly. It is the in
between that it is in right thenand there. The chrysalis will
hang in this position in itschrysalis for anywhere from
eight to twelve days. Once yousee it start to turn dark,
black, you start seeing maybethe colors of those wings behind
(18:14):
that chrysalis case, this is asignal that you are about to
have an adult monarch butterfly.
Once the adult butterfly emergesor ecloses, it will hang there
for a period of time, it's goingto dry its wings and it's going
to pump the fluid that's in itsbody into its wings. It's going
to look kind of deflated at Andit's going to spend several
(18:34):
hours doing this. And generally,after eclosing, the adult
butterfly will not eat for abouttwenty four hours. It'll just
hang out there, getting readyfor its journey and if this is
the migration generation, it isgetting ready for a very long
journey indeed. So only releaseyour adult back out into the
(18:54):
wild making sure that it is arain free day and ideally when
temperatures are above 55degrees Fahrenheit.
And keep in mind as you areraising monarch caterpillars,
things are going to happen thatwill lead to its death. There
might be parasites in it, theremight be disease, I have seen on
instance where milkweed has beensprayed with an insecticide on
(19:15):
accident, and all other kinds ofunexplained things. Another big
thing is avoid handling thecaterpillar. You don't want to
pick it up and move it aroundwhen you move it, you want to
make sure that you're picking itup on whatever leaf or stem that
it is on and moving it that way.If it has, say, getting ready to
(19:36):
molt and put its silk pad down,you might injure it or
potentially kill it by pickingup that caterpillar and moving
around.
So make sure that you're nevermoving or handling that
caterpillar wherever it isresting. Now, how many
caterpillars could you, shouldyou, would you want to rear
(19:56):
indoors that would still beresponsible? Well, Xerxes
Society says no more than 10.But if you're doing that, 10
extra butterflies in the monarchpopulation is not going to make
much of a difference. However,there are many more people doing
(20:16):
this across North America inclassrooms, at home.
There's even companies that aredoing this. And so when we
factor this out, you know, oneperson who is raising 10, not as
much, but if you get a millionpeople raising 10, well that
starts to become a majorcontributor to the population
(20:39):
genetics occurring in themonarch, but wild monarch
butterflies. And so I wouldsuggest or recommend that if
this is something that interestsyou, limit your number to 10. If
you could hold off doing this,maybe participate, maybe use
your rearing as part of aclassroom. You can bring it into
(21:02):
a classroom.
That way the classroom, theydon't have to rear their own
monarch butterflies.Essentially, we're trying to
reduce this number so that we'renot being oh, contributing what
might be a lack of fitness intothe wild monarch population.
Well, alright, I have maybe comedown pretty hard on those who
like to rear monarchbutterflies, and I will say I've
(21:24):
done this myself. We have hadsuccesses at home, we have had
failures, I have watched fliesemerge from monarch butterflies
as parasites. Has been a it hasbeen a great learning
experience, I'll say that.
And my kids might always bescarred for life watching those
little fly larvae crawl theirway out of the monarch butterfly
(21:49):
caterpillar. But so if I've comedown hard and you're saying well
what can we do? I'd say of allthe the research papers and all
the things that I've read aboutmonarch butterflies and the
things, the problems they have,the things that are, you know,
affecting their population,whether it's disease, predators,
(22:12):
parasites, pesticides, climatechange, You know, these research
papers, you know, they try toquantify and indicate these
particular things, but it'salmost every single research
paper. If you just go all theway to the end, that conclusion
section, they all say, yes,whatever it is we were studying,
it might, is, could be, or isn'tpotential factor in monarch
(22:37):
decline, but they all say thenumber one contributor to
monarch butterfly decline ishabitat. There's just not enough
of it.
And when we look at thepopulations that occur in
Illinois, we actually see arebound effect in the summer
months here. So it seems asthough the population levels are
(23:01):
able to push back to where theywere the year before. So what is
it that might potentially beaffecting that overall
population? Well, we lookspecifically at that migration
generation, moving from some allthe way up into Canada all the
way down to Mexico. And the lackof nectar sources, floral
(23:25):
resources for these butterfliesto have fuel and energy to get
them to where they need to be tooverwinter down in Mexico.
That is a major contributor tothe decline of the monarch
butterfly population. And it'sthe one of the major concerns,
it's habitat. Habitat loss. Sowhat can we do to support
(23:49):
monarch habitat? Well, I mean,volunteer local conservation
groups.
Illinois Extension has a MasterNaturalist program that is just
conservation volunteers, we goout and educate folks about
wildlife, plants, animals, allthat stuff that happens in
nature around us. Support localland preservation, you know,
(24:14):
community pollinator projects.These are all ways to do this.
And I do have one idea, onething that we have been doing
actually here in WesternIllinois locally, which has
seemed to prove some results.And I want to talk about a
program that you couldpotentially enroll in, that is
the Monarch Waystation program.
(24:35):
Monarch Waystation programstarted at University of Kansas.
Chip Taylor began this programwhere you could certify a piece
of property as a MonarchWaystation. So a waystation
would be like a garden, it couldbe as small as a couple
containers, there's no reallyminimum size here. It could be a
(24:59):
garden size, pollinator backyardsize, it could be a prairie. But
what it is is just getting dotson the map.
Where are we creating habitat inNorth America? And what this
habitat provides is that larvalfood source for the caterpillar
and a nectar source for theadult butterfly, especially food
(25:20):
sources for that migrationgeneration. I believe you can go
online, we'll leave links to theweigh station program down
below. Now there's all differenttypes of programs as well.
That's what originated inKansas, it is now kind of more
of a nationwide program.
University of IllinoisExtension, we have our own, we
have our pollinator pocketsprogram, we have our
(25:42):
conservation home program, wehave a lot of habitat programs
that you can even do here withour organization. But I like
this waste station programbecause a long time ago, I would
say maybe twelve years ago, someof our Master Gardener
volunteers and I, we gottogether and we said, well how
(26:02):
can we measure that we're makingan impact with our monarch
butterfly education? And so Isaid, well if we can tell people
about monarch butterfly, how wecan provide habitat for our
wildlife and get them to sign upas a Monarch Waystation, then
that is data that shows thatwe're having effect. You can
(26:25):
actually go on the waystationwebsite and there's a database
of where these weigh stationsare located in the country. And
so when we draw like a radiuscircle around our neck of the
woods, and after a few years ofdoing this effort, we can see a
significant increase in MonarchWay stations in our part of the
(26:46):
state of Illinois, which I go tosay that that means that we are
having an impact.
Now, there's nothing better thana little bit of competition, I
would say, when it comes toanything human related, right?
And so our goal with, you know,you know, kind of our volunteer
(27:07):
goal, our Master Gardeners andnow Master Naturalists program,
which has sprung up since then,our goal is to make our part of
Illinois and then Illinois thestate the Monarch Waystation
capital. And so here's where thenumbers stand right now. There
are currently 52,932 MonarchWaystation habitats as of
(27:30):
08/15/2025. That is nationwide,that is across the country, and
there's even a few in Australiaas well.
Now, when we break this out bystate, we Illinois is in second
place. The first place is Texaswith 4,271 way stations. But
(27:53):
Illinois, we have only we arecurrently at 4,078 way stations.
We have like 200 way stations togo and we can overtake Texas and
be in the lead. So come on,Illinois.
If you are in Illinois oranywhere in the country, but
Illinois, I mean, come on, I gotthis little competitive spirit
(28:14):
here. If we can get 200 moreweigh stations registered out
there, if you have milkweed, ifyou have nectar sources, if you
are stewarding the landscape formonarchs, for other wild native
insects, for birds, reptiles,mammals, any of that. It all
contributes to that. Registerfor that Monarch Waystation. It
(28:35):
does cost $18 processing fee,and if you want to pay double
that $36 they will send you analuminum sign as well.
You will get a specific number,you'll appear on their registry,
and you can put up that aluminumsign, which generates
conversation with other peoplein the community. People see
(28:55):
that, they say, oh, well that'swhat we can, something we could
do to help in conservation. Andit just gets people talking, it
gets the conversation startedabout habitat conservation and
how we can incorporate that intoour agricultural and our
landscape lands that we live,work, and play in. Well, was a
(29:16):
lot of great information aboutmonarch butterflies, everything
from their adversities that theyencounter to tips for rearing
them, which again, I don'treally recommend we do that.
Maybe save those for specialoccasions, special events.
And if you are going to do that,make sure that you do only 10 or
(29:38):
less than that. And so, yeah,restrain yourself. And actually,
coming up, we have an event thatwe do every year in Galesburg.
It is called the MonarchMigration Festival. It happens
it always happens the Saturdayafter Labor Day.
This year, is September 6. Itwill be in the morning. It's
going to be at Galesburg NatureCenter in Galesburg, Illinois.
(30:01):
And this is essentially where wejust get together. We have
education stations.
There's a few vendors. We gotmusic. We got stories, and yes,
we will even release some taggedcaptive reared monarch
butterflies. And so we're justgetting together to sort of
celebrate, it's the end of theseason, It's the end of the
(30:22):
growing season. The monarchbutterflies are migrating south,
and it's it is a celebration ofthat.
And so, hey, come check us out.If you can't make it this year,
again, we're there every year.The first Saturday or this is
Saturday after Labor Day inGalesburg, Illinois. It is a fun
time and people come from allover to attend. Well, the Good
Growing podcast is a productionof University of Illinois
Extension, edited this week byme, Chris Enroth.
(30:44):
Hey, listeners. Thank you fordoing what you do best and that
is listening. Or if you watchedus on YouTube, watching. And as
always, keep on growing. Hey, Abig thanks for you.
(31:07):
Thank you for doing what you dodo do. You do do best. What you
do do best.
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The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show. Clay Travis and Buck Sexton tackle the biggest stories in news, politics and current events with intelligence and humor. From the border crisis, to the madness of cancel culture and far-left missteps, Clay and Buck guide listeners through the latest headlines and hot topics with fun and entertaining conversations and opinions.