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Butterfly Pavilion partnering to Restore Mexican Overwintering Habitat
Butterfly Pavilion partnering to Restore Mexican Overwintering Habitat
Our final shoutout goes to the Butterfly Pavilion!
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 oyamel forests provide critical overwintering habitat for the monarch butterfly as it carries out its cross-country, multi-generational migration. The migratory monarch has shown critical declines in numbers in recent decades. The project aim to plant 100,000 new oyamel fir trees in the Biosphere. Grant 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.
Congratulations, Butterfly Pavilion!
Toledo Zoo and Aquarium awarded $22,000 for Project Prairie Program
Toledo Zoo and Aquarium awarded $22,000 for Project Prairie Program
Shoutout goes to the Toledo Zoo & Aquarium and the Project Prairie Program.
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 nectaring plant diversity and density.
Congratulations, Toledo Zoo & Aquarium!
Memphis Zoo and Overton Park Conservancy awarded $11,002 for Monarch Habitat
Memphis Zoo and Overton Park Conservancy awarded $11,002 for Monarch Habitat
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 host and nectaring habitat in Overton Park for monarch butterflies. They were awarded $11,002 for the project, which will be implemented over the next year. 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. See the pilot project photo below! The team is looking forward to monitoring both locations over the next year to see how many adult and larval caterpillars 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!
Congratulations, Memphis Zoo and Overton Park Conservancy!
Turtle Back Zoo and the Zoological Sciety of New Jersey
Turtle Back Zoo and the Zoological Sciety of New Jersey
Essex County Turtle Back Zoo and The Zoological Society of New Jersey are helping to support AZA SAFE Monarch in their mission to protect pollinators. Through the Turtle Back Biodiversity Fund, they are raising money through membership sales and donations to help support habitat work across the SAFE Monarchs Network! They have raised over $13,000 that will be distributed for habitat projects across partners!
The Bergen County Zoo, along with the help of the Bergen County Audubon Society, recently installed a new 20x15 foot butterfly garden! The president of the Bergen County Audubon Society, Don Torino, helped create the layout for the garden and instructed on what plants to install. They won a grant from the Society to help support the project! All the plants are native to north New Jersey. The goal is to provide more habitat for local wildlife, including monarch butterflies. The garden was planted by the Zoo Conservation Crew (ZCC), Bergen County Zoo’s teen volunteer group that partakes in conservation projects and helps with zoo events. ZCC participants learned about the plants and why they were chosen before planting. They hope to continue to use the garden as an educational resource and a study site in the future.
On Earth Day, the L.A. Zoo launched a new Zoo-wide program called Project Pollinator. The new umbrella project will cover several new and continuing initiatives within the Zoo's Conservation Strategic Plan, including Saving Animals from Extinction (SAFE) programs for North American songbirds and monarchs; the Zoo’s turf replacement and pollinator garden projects; and Project Pollinator HQ (PPHQ), a newly renovated exterior space in the Winnick Family Children’s Zoo. The PPHQ acts as an apartment building facade, beautified by a rich and lively container garden, showing that any outdoor space–not just a big yard with a landscaping budget–can be useful for planting in urban areas. The Project Pollinator HQ and the new pollinator gardens have become a space for relaxation and education, engaging guests in local conservation topics like native planting and community science, to support native wildlife, specifically pollinators.
Before transformation into the PPHQ
After transformation in the Winnick Family Children's Zoo
Designed to highlight what pollinator habitat can look like across communities
This space includes learning activities, community science, conservation messaging, nature play, and milkweed propagation.
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