The Toledo Zoo & Aquarium was recently awarded the AZA Conservation Grants Fund, a $22,000 award with Monarch Joint Venture as a listed partner. The grant is meant to fund an extension of the zoo’s Project PRAIRIE program to develop a Conservation Institute for local teachers. The institute is intended to improve teachers' conservation knowledge, value, and efficacy so they can identify as conservation leaders in their community. Monarch butterflies represent the focal species for the institute and will provide a case study for teachers to base inquiry and project based learning in their classrooms. As part of the institute, teachers will be provided with resources to improve pre-existing prairie habitats on their school grounds to benefit monarch butterflies. This includes increasing milkweed and nectar plant diversity and density.  

The Memphis Zoo and Overton Park Conservancy partnered to apply for a grant from the Association of Zoos and Aquariums Conservation Grants Fund to create breeding habitat in Overton Park for monarch butterflies. They chose two areas—one in the Veterans Plaza area of the park adjacent to the Memphis Zoo, and a larger area in the park’s southeast corner, a former City vehicle maintenance facility that is being converted to parkland. Overton Park Conservancy planted the Veterans Plaza area this summer as a pilot to test the viability of the project, recording more than 250 species of insects using the garden, including multiple monarch caterpillars on native milkweed plants. The team is looking forward to monitoring both locations to see how many adults and larvae use the gardens, and to spreading the word in our community about the positive impact of planting native species!

Just for fun, here’s a link to iNaturalist project where they recorded observations of all those insects in the small pilot garden over the past six months!

Hear from the Morgan Belle with Disney Conservation!

The Disney Conservation Team is conducting research on monarch butterflies by using radio telemetry tags, referred to as “backpacks” by the team. These tiny tags, roughly the size of a grain of rice, are worn on the butterflies’ backs. These “backpacks" allow conservation scientists to monitor how butterflies navigate their habitats by communicating with antennae around Walt Disney World® Resort. The Conservation Team has planted several species of milkweed around the property, allowing the team to understand the monarchs’ movement, including their milkweed preference, based on data from their backpacks.

Hear from the Travis Kurtz at the John Ball Zoo on T the Habitat Hero Program.

Travis is the Community Science Coordinator at the John Ball Zoo, where he administers a variety of community-based science and conservation projects. This presentation will focus on the largest project, Habitat Hero, using native plant giveaways as a replicable model for augmenting urban pollinator habitat, and as a gateway to engaging our local communities in pollinator conservation.

Get a sneak peek of the program and the interactive dashboard! 

Hear from Shiran Hershovich at the Butterfly Pavilion on the Collaborative Oyamel Fir Restoration Project.

Butterfly Pavilion partners with Mexico’s Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve, the National Commission of Protected Natural Areas of Mexico (CONANP), the Mexican Consulate of Denver, and the Mexican Agency for International Development Cooperation (AMEXCID),  to develop impactful restoration efforts in the region to safeguard the migration. The oyamel fir forests of Mexico are the most endangered forest in the country, with less than 5% of its original range remaining. The project aims to plant 100,000 new oyamel fir trees in the Biosphere. Activities also seek to be inclusive of neighboring communities with meaningful local outreach and involvement through the development of pollinator gardens in partner schools in the Biosphere’s buffer zones that will also provide important nectar sources for the monarchs of the region.

Hear from Rachel and Kelley on the updates from the Collective Evaluation Project since piloting in the fall of 2024 and where we are now!