New Brunswick man raising butterflies at home to boost numbers

A New Brunswick man is raising monarch butterflies in his home and releasing themin a bid to boost their numbers and to teach his grandchildren about nature and conservation.

JimWilson, a naturalist who lives in Quispamsis,says the colourful insects are in real trouble and he's trying to do everything he can to help them.

"There's something about monarchs that's always fascinated me," he said. "But in recent years, their numbers have just plummeted."

So Wilson decided to save as many as he canat his home in Quispamsis. He has planted milkweed in his garden, which monarchs use exclusively to lay their eggs. And he's enlisted the help of his family, including his grandchildren Emma McGrath, 13, and Joshua McGrath, 6.

Every summer, they search the milkweed plants for monarch eggs and caterpillars. Then they carefully raise them to adulthood in an old aquarium tank topped with mesh.

They watch as the monarchs develop from caterpillar to chrysalis over the course of about a month. Finally, when the monarchsemerge fully-grown, Wilson and his grandchildren set them free.

Wilson says it makes a significant difference in the chances of a monarch making it to adulthood.

"In the wild there's about an 80 per centmortality rate," he said. "By bringing them indoors and raising them in a controlled atmosphere, the chances of them surviving and growing into adults is closer to 100 per cent."

Wilson says it's also a great way to teach kids about nature, especially because the life of a monarch has "so many dimensions."

"Their geography, travel, dependence on milkweed and the precariousness of their life cycle the whole process is fascinating for everyone and it's no trouble to get the kids involved."

His grandchildren seem to agree. Emma calls the yearly tradition "fun" and Joshua says he loves helping his grandfather.

On Thursday, Wilson, Emma, Josh and neighbour Connor Steeves, 6, released three fully-grown monarchs into the wild. Wilson says they will live about a month and he hopes they will stay in New Brunswick to lay their eggs, maybe even on his own milkweed. He expects those eggs will likely grow to be the generation that flies 4,000 kilometres to Mexico for the winter. They will live about eight months.

If Wilson can find any of that generation, he will try to tag them. He buys small stickers through a program at the University of Kansas and affixes them to the butterfly's wings for people to find in Mexico. So far, he's heard of twoof the butterflies he tagged being found in El Rosario, Mexico, where more than 70 million monarchs fly each year.

New Brunswick is about the furthest point in North America from which the monarchs make their journey.

Wilson says the milkweed plant has "just about run out" in the province.But he's noticing more and more people becominginterested in helping monarchs at home.

He and two friends ran a workshop on monarch rearing and tagging at the Festival of Nature in Sackville in June and he's getting queries from people in Nova Scotia as well. He's also helped the Green Village operation in Fredericton start a project to grow milkweed plants and promote monarchs to the public, by providing seeds from his own garden.

Wilson encourages more people in the province to get involved. He recommends planting either common or swamp milkweed and "learning as much as you can about monarch butterflies."