Saving Native Butterflies: One Garden at a Time

In a previous episode we highlighted the State of the Butterflies report, which found that we are losing butterflies at a rate of 1.3% per year in the contiguous US: more than one-fifth of our butterflies disappeared between 2000 and 2020. Perhaps more alarming, over 40% of assessed species fell in numbers by 50% or more—and two dozen species suffered more than 90% losses. So what can we do to help butterflies? 

To give us guidance are butterfly experts, Ray Moranz and Kevin Burls, both of whom you may remember from previous episodes. Ray is a Xerces Pollinator Conservation Specialist and NRCS Partner Biologist based in Oklahoma. He works to conserve pollinators on rangelands in the central U.S. and conducts research on monarch butterfly migration and overwintering in the southeastern  U.S. Kevin is a Xerces Society Endangered Species Conservation Biologist based in northern Nevada. His work focuses on protecting the hundreds of butterfly species that inhabit deserts, forests, and grasslands across the western United States. 

*Correction: when referencing the book Attracting Beneficial Insects, the correct title is Farming with Native Beneficial Insects: Ecological Pest Control Solutions.

** Correction: When referencing the tool Monarch Plant Finder, the correct name for the tool is Plants for Monarchs. 

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Photo: Xerces Society/Nancy Lee Adamson

Thank you for listening! For more information go to xerces.org/bugbanter.

Transcript

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Matthew: Welcome to Bug Banter with the Xerces Society, where we explore the world of invertebrates and discover how to help these extraordinary animals. If you want to support our work, go to xerces.org/donate.

Rachel: Hi, I'm Rachel Dunham in Missoula, Montana.

Matthew: And I'm Matthew Shepherd in Santa Clara, California.

Rachel: In a previous episode we highlighted the State of the Butterflies report, which found that we are losing butterflies at a rate of 1.3% per year in the contiguous US: more than one-fifth of our butterflies disappeared between the year 2000 and 2020. Perhaps more alarming, over 40% of assessed species fell in numbers by 50% or more—and two dozen species suffered more than 90% losses. So what can we do to help butterflies?

Rachel: To give us guidance are butterfly experts, Ray Moranz and Kevin Burls, both of whom you may remember from previous episodes. Ray is a Xerces pollinator conservation specialist and NRCS partner biologist based in Oklahoma. He works to conserve pollinators on rangelands in the central U.S. and conducts research on monarch butterfly migration and overwintering in the southeastern U.S. Kevin is a Xerces Society endangered species conservation biologist based in northern Nevada. His work focuses on protecting the hundreds of butterfly species that inhabit deserts, forests, and grasslands across the western United States.

Rachel: Welcome back to Bug Banter, Ray and Kevin! We're very excited to have you here today.

Ray: Great to be here.

Kevin: Thanks for having us.

Matthew: In the introduction, Rachel noted that a fifth of our butterflies disappeared over a 20-year period. And used the phrase, "Perhaps more alarming." Should we be alarmed? Does it matter that we have fewer butterflies?

Kevin: Yeah, I think it does. Some of the work that Rachel is referencing comes from a 2025 publication in the journal, Science. And the Xerces Society published a report following up on that publication and included a lot more information, as well. And I think one of the things that I like to talk to people about with that report is that species-specific results aside, what we see are declines in common, widespread species. And so one familiar example of that is the monarch, obviously, but that turns out to possibly have just been a canary in a coal mine. And the problem of widespread declining species is partly that these are the things that glue natural and anthropogenic ecosystems together. They are the things that eat lots and lots of plants, and the common things, the widespread things, are the animals that feed lots and lots of other animals. And so one particular study in the last several years found that out of 20 different bird families with data on what nestlings eat, in 16 of those bird families, caterpillars dominate the nestling diets. And so when we start to lose these common animals, we start to see the things that we've seen in other animal communities, like songbird communities, which are declines in those groups that are associated with the loss of Lepidopterans, in particular.

Matthew: And so it sounds like the decline in diversity does matter. I know the report found that some species were expanding or growing in numbers, and it's a kind of question that I get asked from time to time, which is, “Can't the ones that are expanding, can they just replace the ones we lose?”

Ray: I'm not an author on the report. Kevin is, of course. And it's a phenomenal report based on fantastic research, in my opinion. But, no, we can't let a whole bunch of species decline, and then the other ones take their spot. That won't work that way. As we lose species we lose beautiful creatures, wonderful creatures, but we also lose ecosystem function. Some of the butterflies we lose are pollinating certain plants, are food to certain vertebrate or invertebrate predators. And when they disappear, in some cases their roles will be partially taken over by species—other species. But for the most part, no. Those ecological roles that they play are not gonna get fulfilled by other species.

Kevin: I just wanted to add that in addition to that excellent point that each species has an ecological role to play, the species that are increasing in abundance, those are still happening in concurrence with the overall decline in abundance of butterflies, right? So we've seen a roughly 20% decline in butterfly abundance over the last 20 years or so based on the data from that report. That includes all those species that are increasing in abundance. Some of them appearing to increase pretty rapidly. Expanding north, in certain instances. Species that maybe already are doing that are continuing to expand their distribution in some ways. That's all happening, and we've still lost one in five butterflies in the last 20 years.

Ray: And Kevin, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it true that there are a good deal more species decreasing than there are species increasing, correct?

Kevin: That's absolutely true, Ray. Yes, it is a few very notable species that are increasing, and many more species that are decreasing. And the kind of change in composition of butterfly fauna—the groups of butterflies that we see—that mimics an issue that we have in many other groups of animals, or plants, especially. Where we start to see a loss in the native diversity, we see other plants taking their place. But there are many fewer kinds, and so then we see a total shift in the type of plant communities that we see on the landscape. Yeah, exactly.

Matthew: Yeah, no, I'd say that was a great point you made, Kevin, because I've read the report, and for some of the increasing species it's 500%, or 1000%. But, of course, that doesn't bear any relationship to how many there were originally. That's just proportionate. So it's like, if we had 10 originally and now, we've got 500% more, what's that? Another 50? So it's not a huge number to start with. And I know we've talked around this point, but again—and I'm being a little bit of a devil's advocate here—we sometimes get asked, “What's the impact of the loss of a species?” Whether that's a butterfly or whatever. But in this case, particularly butterflies in the context of this conversation—are there examples of how the loss of a butterfly has impacted the ecosystem it lived in?

Kevin: Yeah, Ray and I had a chance to chat about this beforehand, and it occurs to us that neither of us could come up with—not that there aren't examples. I would hesitate—. Neither of us are going to be the authority on this, of course—but neither of us could come up with an example where a butterfly was similar to something that we think of—the term is “ecosystem engineer”—when their presence or absence really changes the function of an ecosystem. And so one example that's in a lot of textbooks is beavers. Beaver dam creation, or the lack thereof, really changes the landscape. I don't think of an example like that necessarily, but there are examples of, certainly examples of cascading changes depending on the loss of a single species.

Kevin: One example is: I was able to do some rearing of Melissa blue butterfly caterpillars with my wife for her master's degree. And one of the things we were doing is we were rearing out these parasitoid wasps, which I think I've mentioned before on Bug Banter, which are these animals that use the caterpillars as a host animal, and then emerge as a pupa or adult and kill the caterpillar in the process. One of the parasitoid wasps that we reared from those butterfly caterpillars had only previously been seen reared from the Xerces blue. The Xerces blue is the species that the Xerces Society is named after, which went extinct several decades ago. And so that is just a kind of putative example of a case where when you lose the butterfly species, you may also be losing these other unseen animals that play important roles in the ecosystem. And in this case, it's these very tiny, little parasitoids that are just extremely abundant and diverse on almost every landscape.

Kevin: And then just to bring back the point that I was talking about with songbird communities, and bird communities feeding on caterpillars, that there is a fairly strong correlation between the declines in Lepidopteran larvae—that is butterfly and moth caterpillars—and declines in specific bird communities. And so obviously, there's a lot of experimental work to be done refining that relationship in a causal way. But one thing we definitely see is that when we lose that particular genera of invertebrate—those Lepidopteran larvae—we see a consummate loss in the bird community, as well.

Ray: And I'd like to talk about the pollination services that butterflies provide. Butterflies, in general, on average are not as good pollinators as bees. Bees are the best. But [butterflies] can be excellent pollinators for certain plants. And some butterflies pollinate better than others. And there are some plant species that absolutely depend on specific butterfly species as their pollinator. So if we lose that butterfly species, we'll lose that plant. And that could lead to a cascade of effects that did have a significant impact on the ecosystem. We do know that butterflies, for instance, provide huge pollination services to the cotton crop. A study came out a few years ago from Texas A&M University showing that butterflies, in general, contribute about $100 million a year of pollination services to the cotton crop in Texas. That's pretty colossal. If you lose butterflies, you're gonna have a lot less cotton produced by the farmers, and there's gonna be a lot of major economic cost. And obviously, ecosystem cost, as well. Yeah, butterflies are important, and we can't afford to lose them.

Rachel: What are the major causes of butterfly decline? I know we've talked about this a lot on Bug Banter, but for new listeners, what are those major causes of butterfly decline?

Ray: When I came into this job nine years ago, I'd already been employed as a butterfly ecologist for a while. And for me, the big emphasis was on habitat. I live in prairie country. So much of our prairie had been converted to row crops like wheat, or corn, or soy. Or perhaps it had been mismanaged so there weren't enough host plants, there weren't enough nectar plants. And that's really my heavy focus of my career. But now that I'm with the Xerces Society and I'm surrounded by pesticide experts, and folks like Kevin who are doing analyses on the entire butterfly fauna of North America, and trying to figure out what's happening, I realize there are a lot of other factors that I hadn't even been thinking about.

Kevin: Ray is exactly right. I think our generation, and most generations of conservation-oriented individuals before us had hammered into us from an early age that habitat destruction is the first and foremost cause of species extirpations. And I think in many areas that's still true. But thanks to—and Ray pointed out—work by many amazing members of our pesticide reduction team, and collaborations between our team and numerous individuals across the research community in this area, one of the things we're finding on land, and specifically on butterfly, caterpillar food plants—that has already been shown in waterways—is that pesticide products are simply not staying where they are applied. Most—the vast majority—of pesticide applicators are following label instructions, and want to protect the animals around their lands. And yet studies that have been done, again in collaboration with Xerces Society in California and New Mexico in recent years, have both found widespread contamination of Lepidopteran host plants with herbicide, fungicide, and pesticide residues.

Kevin: And so I think we as a community are still certainly coming to terms with the effects that this is having on butterflies—both common butterflies and already endangered butterflies. There are studies that Xerces has not been a part of that have found that the critical habitats for endangered grassland butterflies in the Midwest are also coated in pesticide residues, whether those plants that are sampled are right next to an agricultural field or several miles in the interior of a wildlife refuge. So we have serious issues to deal with. And I think there's—. The evidence that comes out in an experimental framework shows that pesticides are playing just an enormous role in both killing, and in reducing the health of butterfly populations.

Kevin: And then the other kind of emerging threat that seems to be coming out in research on butterfly populations are the effects of climate change, especially droughts, and increases in temperature. And specifically the timing of those events. So, you know, we know that climate change is not equal across the globe. And we know that different types of climate changes are happening at different rates. And so things like decreases in precipitation, and increases in temperature in the fall that maybe extend seasonality and have effects on plants that the butterflies feed on as caterpillars and adults. These sorts of changes are coming out very important, especially in places like the Southwest, which are experiencing those particular changes more—in a more extreme fashion than many other parts of the country, right? The Southwest is warming and drying faster than other parts of the country.

Rachel: Thank you for explaining climate change so eloquently. I think it's this term that feels really big to people, and it just means everything's heating up. But as you said, it's impacting different parts of the globe in different ways. And in some ways, some areas are getting more water and hurricanes and, like you said, other places are experiencing more drought and less moisture. And so it's complicated. And I feel like that's how it is with insect decline, in general. We talk about death by a thousand cuts, that there's all of these stressors impacting these insects. But for butterflies, do you feel that one of these has more of a greater impact? Or is it the same with climate change, where it's like, it depends on what butterfly you're talking about, and where that butterfly lives?

Kevin: In the Southwest, I think it is warming and drying. I think a lot of people that study butterflies in that area are coming to terms with the exact causal ways in which drought is affecting various butterfly species. So yeah, I think there. And then, the other thing that I tell people—. Occasionally, I'm lucky enough to get asked my opinion on what a graduate student should do for their research in butterfly conservation—which is obviously a very nice thing to be asked. And to me, pesticide exposure on the landscape, and its effects at those, what we call “field-realistic levels,” like what's happening on the ground. How is that affecting butterflies in these environments? That is a black box where every time we shine a light into it, I think we see that it's more important than we know. And that's often the case with real scientific discoveries.

Kevin: Just a quick diversion. There's fungi that grow on plant roots. Ectomycorrhizal fungi, which some people may have heard about. When I was in grad school, I think that was a thing that we thought was just on pine trees. And then we thought it was just on some other type of tree. And now it turns out that it's just this ubiquitous, mutualistic relationship that's everywhere. And that's the process of our scientific discovery—was finding out. And I think we're gonna find that with pesticides. I think we're gonna start, and then the wheel's gonna get into motion, and we're gonna start to find out more and more.

Matthew: I guess the next step is: what can people do to help butterflies? We don't want to just circle the drain, and get gloomier and gloomier, right? We want to give people some hope. Point them towards some things they can do. So, are there places that we should be focusing our efforts?

Ray: I am, like I said earlier, a big habitat ecologist type of guy. And I do hope, indeed, that people spend some time on the areas they can control—their gardens, their yards, their farms, if they have them, and provide the habitat the butterflies need. The host plants, the nectar plants, and then a clean environment lacking in pesticides. And, you know, we have plenty of resources at the Xerces Society website to help people with host plants—nectar plants, in particular—but also with host plants.

Kevin: Yeah, I think it is worth it pointing out that you can seek out pesticide-free plants from nurseries as an individual. And that is extra work for the individual to do. But if you're willing to put in that extra work by looking at plant labels and researching the companies that grow the plants that you buy at nurseries, you can get a head start by putting a plant that is pesticide-free into your yard. And there are practices, even at a yard scale, that you can do to prevent pesticide drift. Buffers, and hedges, and edge rows are real things that do real work. And that also is extra work because you need to learn a little bit. You don't wanna put a pollinator plant in as a pesticide buffer, right? Your pesticide buffer needs to be things that aren't attracting pollinators, but are blocking the wind. I live in a very windy place. Many people live in windy places. And so this is a thing that you can work into your landscaping plans and make changes. The cultural changes, small changes that really make big differences into that pesticide-free environment.

Kevin: The other thing that I wanna add more for folks who live in cities and towns, is that more and more folks live within communities that are governed by HOAs—homeowners’ associations. Those homeowners’ associations often control the landscaping of the common areas. And so that includes the management of turf, as well as things like what kinds of plants can be put into the ground. And the homeowners do have a say in how these associations are run. And so I think that being active in your local community—and I think that's the smallest local community that many people are a part of—I think is a huge way in which individuals can support butterflies.

Matthew: Between the two of you, do you have examples of successful habitat creation that you could share with our listeners?

Ray: Absolutely. The other day I was at MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida, which is the home of Central Command, which I didn't realize until then. Pretty important set of generals dictate military tactics. But more relevant to the topic, I saw a Florida atala butterfly there. Extremely beautiful butterfly. When I was a little boy, I learned of this butterfly. It's a small, beautiful, brilliant butterfly. It's black, blue, and brilliant ruby red. And what I learned as a little boy is this butterfly was going extinct, at least in the U.S. It lived in South Florida, and it was going extinct because South Florida was getting converted from native habitats into giant megalopolis. Guess what? It's not going extinct. It's actually expanding its range. How is it expanding its range? It turns out that the host plant of the Florida atala is a native cycad called the coontie plant. The Latin name is Zamia pumila. And it's an attractive plant. It's a neat subtropical plant. And people started planting it in their gardens just because they like the plant. All of a sudden, there's more and more food for the caterpillars of the Florida atala butterfly in Miami, Fort Lauderdale, West Palm Beach. And that butterfly started to rebound. And then people were planting it in Tampa, and so the butterfly moved up to Tampa. And people have this plant way up in North Florida. This butterfly has expanded its range to North Florida, as I just discovered. And yeah, I got to see one at MacDill Air Force Base. First one I've seen since I lived in Florida 30 years ago. So it was quite a treat. So there are successes out there. If you plant the right plants, you can get some really great things in your backyard, and you can make a difference.

Kevin: On the West Coast, I just might add one example that we like to bring up. We—me and some of the folks that I work with in the western states. And I know that you, Rachel and Matthew, have had a Bug Banter on this species in particular, on this butterfly in particular, is the Fender's blue butterfly. And the Fender's blue butterfly is in the Willamette Valley area. And at one point, I believe the population was down to some 1,500 individual butterflies. And in recent years, it's rebounded up to over, I think, an estimated 100,000. And was somewhat recently down-listed under the Endangered Species Act from an endangered species to a threatened species, which I believe is the first butterfly species to have had that happen. And that's a sign of successful restoration. It is a result of intense collaboration between federal agencies and private landowners. And it involves specifically the sort of stuff that Ray is talking about. Increasing the number of host plants, making sure that homeowners know how to protect the habitat that they have. Yeah, and an additional restoration of grassland remnants in an area. Where the butterflies like to live—where the humans live—a lot of that habitat has disappeared. And so even small amounts of restoration—. And enough small restorations, in some ways, can add up to a big restoration. It's not one-to-one. There's obviously a lot of detail in that idea. But when it comes to restoration for small things like butterflies, it is somewhat true that a lot of little restorations add up to a big one.

Matthew: And, of course, it has to be said that for anybody who has been a butterfly gardener, or a pollinator gardener, whether that's in their own garden or a community garden—I'm sure everybody has seen the response and the results of their own work. Because you can say, "Oh, we created this, and now we're seeing more butterflies coming in." So it's a very satisfying thing.

Matthew: With all of this, is there one particular component of butterfly habitat that people forget about? I'm just wondering, from your experience, whether when people come to you, do they overlook anything in particular that's worth flagging so that people will remember in the future?

Kevin: One thing that I definitely harp on. The plants that the butterflies eat as caterpillars. The generic idea of a pollinator garden, the vision that probably pops into most people's heads is adult animals flying from flower to flower. Bees, butterflies, and so on. But of course, the butterflies, most of their life is spent as an immature animal, as an egg, or a caterpillar, or a pupa. And so they need the habitat, and they need the resources for that. And while most people know that monarchs eat milkweed as caterpillars, they have less information available to them on what all the other butterflies eat. And so learning about that takes time. But there's a few good plants. I, in fact, got to write a little blog on Lepidoptera power plants, or plants that feed many different types of Lepidopterans. So that is helpful in that you don't have to put every single plant in the ground. And especially when it comes to those, many butterflies feed on native and non-native plants. That is plants that are native to the region in which they're grown. And I'm representing the Nevada Native Plant Society with my shirt here. Focusing on native plant species is, obviously, very important. I'm sure we've talked about that in other podcasts, but we could go on about that.

Kevin: And then last but not least, the only other thing I wanted to add in is that a lot of people think about wildflowers, because they are just so pretty and evocative. But a lot of the numbers game is won by trees and shrubs. And so when it comes to putting plants in the ground, if you only have a little bit of room, putting a shrub that's gonna generate hundreds and hundreds of flowers every season can be a real advantage of scale. And people often forget about those. They maybe take a little more work and a little more care. You have to take care of them for several years, and so on, but they're really beneficial.

Ray: And for me—because I work on monarchs so much. And because, as Kevin pointed out, lots of people associate monarchs with milkweeds—for me, one of the forgotten things are the nectar plants. Okay, yes, you've got the milkweeds they need, but what about the nectar plants they need? Let's make sure we have the nectar plants out there.

Ray: And then, something we've talked about before, making sure they are pesticide-free. And I bought some plants on my last trip, my last research trip to Florida to give to friends down there, and that's one thing I made sure to do was to discuss what these plants were sprayed with. Because you don't wanna be putting things out there that are gonna poison your caterpillars. Or that are gonna have toxic nectar for the butterflies and the bees. And if you go to a nursery and you ask them what was sprayed and they say, "We don't know because we didn't even grow these. These got grown far away and shipped here." And that's very common, by the way. Very common. Investigate more. And if you're not confident that you know these plants are clean, consider going somewhere else. Be a detective. Be a stickler on that issue because it really matters to the little critters that are gonna be using those plants for food.

Matthew: Thank you. Sound advice.

Rachel: For folks who might be new to butterfly biology, can you maybe just briefly explain the difference between a host and a nectar plant?

Ray: Sure. Host plants are the are the species that the caterpillar needs. And many butterfly species have caterpillars that are very specialized. They'll only eat a few species that are closely related to each other. And of course, monarch is a fantastic example of that. They only eat milkweeds. Now, it turns out there are about 100 species of milkweeds, but that's still a limited set of what's out there. They're not gonna be eating maples. They're not gonna be eating oaks. They're not gonna be eating carrots. They're only eating milkweeds. Same thing with the black swallowtail. They only eat things in the carrot family. The pipevine swallowtail. You might be able to guess. Those caterpillars only eat pipevine. The host plants are what the caterpillars must eat. The nectar plants are what the adults consume. They go to flowers. Now, of course, we do have butterflies that eat other stuff, like they'll land on your arm and drink some sweat off of it, or rotting fruit. But for those that eat nectar, there are plants out there that are particularly good, particularly popular with butterflies as nectar sources. And we encourage you to plant native versions of those wherever possible.

Rachel: Thank you. That's super helpful. And the perfect segue into my next question. If someone's like, "Great, I wanna do this, but how do I figure out which plants to put in the ground?" What resources are available for people who are interested in creating habitat?

Ray: Well, I'm heavily involved in work on that with monarchs, and hopefully in time with other species. And the Xerces Society has been heavily involved with this for a few decades. So I definitely encourage folks to go to our website, xerces.org, and search for our pollinator plant lists. We don't have lists for every butterfly, but those pollinator plant lists provide the top 50 native sources of nectar and pollen for bees, butterflies, and other pollinators in each major region of the lower 48 states. So there's one for Florida, there's one for the desert Southwest, one for coastal California, I think one for inland California. And that gives you 50 species to start with. If you have a heavy monarch focus, then we have lists of plants just for monarchs.

Ray: But I'm very happy to tell everybody that really soon, sometime this summer, we will be releasing a website that is called the Monarch Plant Finder. So if you're interested in finding native milkweeds and nectar sources for monarchs, you'll go online to the Monarch Plant Finder, type in your zip code, and it will give you a list of all the native plants that, for your zip code, that monarchs use as host plants or nectar plants. And then you can filter it by whether you have a sunny spot or a shady spot, or whether you want tall plants or short plants, whether you have wet soil or dry soil, things like that. We are very excited about this project. And the dream—it's gonna take a while—but the dream is to expand that from the monarch, eventually, to other species of butterflies, and other pollinators. So very excited about what we already have out there, but what is about to come online for you.

Matthew: Wow, that sounds like a pretty amazing resource to have.

Kevin: I just wanted to add to the wonderful plant lists that we have, there's two book resources that I have really enjoyed over the years that Xerces has published for garden design. When it comes to what sort of plants should I put in, and things like considering the bloom period. Flowers bloom for short periods of time, and so having flowers in my area from May to September is a real challenge, and a real primary goal of a pollinator garden. And so to help with things like that, we have—and to understand the design—we have Gardening for Butterflies, which was published primarily by my supervisor, Candice Fallon, years ago. And then another book that I've really enjoyed that's a little bit broader is Attracting Beneficial Insects. And that one just has design for folks who are interested not only in pollinator services, but also in things like pest control. And I know that's slightly off-topic, but it's all obviously wound together, as we have talked about. And many folks who have a pollinator garden, also have a food garden, and managing pests can be done at the same time through the creation of your pollinator garden. So just a worthwhile combination of functions.

Rachel: Ray, you mentioned with this new pollinator plant finder that people will have a link to figure out where those plants are sold at local nurseries. Do we have any resources now where people might have a directory of places that they can go shop and look for native plants?

Ray: Yes, we absolutely do. It's the Xerces Society's Native Plant, Seed, and Services Directory. And if you go online and find that, once again you type in your location or your state, and then it gives you a list of the nurseries near you that sell native plants, native seeds, or services to help plant native plants and native seeds. And these nurseries have been vetted in the respect that, A, we know they sell native plants. And I believe we have talked to them about their pesticide policy, and that we've decided that they're not using a lot of pesticides, and so we're comfortable putting them on that directory. The nurseries on that directory do not pay a fee, so if you're out there and you own a nursery, and you're not in the directory, we'd love for you to be in the directory, so please reach out.

Matthew: Creating habitat obviously is profoundly important for supporting butterflies wherever you live. But if someone doesn't have space for a habitat, or doesn't have the resources for such a project, or maybe just isn't even interested in gardening—which is fine because there are a lot of people who aren't—is there anything else they could do that would help butterflies, and help us recover butterflies nationwide?

Kevin: I might start just by talking a little bit about some of the policy work that I get to be a part of through my work at Xerces Society. We have a campaign that I am sure has been talked about on Bug Banter before, which is our Insects Are Wildlife campaign, which focuses on the fact that there are several U.S. states for which invertebrates, or various parts of the invertebrate group, are not considered wildlife. Definitionally, they're not wildlife under the state codes. And so the state departments of wildlife do not have the ability to conserve invertebrate populations. So for example, the monarch butterfly in Nevada, despite all of the amazing work that the Nevada Department of Wildlife has done across the state, while they're out there doing it, they have not been able, so far, to put milkweed in the ground specifically for monarchs, because the butterflies are not considered wildlife under the state. So I've been working on this project in Nevada, but if folks are interested to find out if their state considers insects as wildlife, they can find that out on our Xerces webpage. There's information on that campaign available.

Kevin: And that leads to the broader point that I would say is that the thing that everybody can do, is the same thing that Xerces tries to do day to day, which is to be an advocate for invertebrates in their community. Most other special interests have established lobby efforts. They have people who stand on their behalf in meetings, and at commissions, and at state legislatures. And so we need people to be those advocates for insects, whether it's leaving comments at state legislature hearings, or showing up in person and being part of a coalition. Or something like I've already mentioned, which is going to a homeowners association meeting and finding out what sort of pesticides and herbicides are applied to the common areas, or onto your own yards, if the landscaping companies manage that. And finding out what sort of plants are allowed to be planted in your front and backyards. Can you put native vegetation, or does it have to be turf grass? And can you change that? Those are actions that you can do as an advocate for invertebrates. So I encourage that sort of thinking.

Matthew: Yeah, that's great. I think at any level, there's something that someone can do to speak up. You mentioned HOAs, you mentioned state, but city council, park districts, neighborhood associations, community gardens, the PTO at your kids' school.

Kevin: Yeah, parks and schools are great examples of places where there's a kind of semi-natural landscape often present, and the quality of that landscape can be very important. And there are many of them in every community. And so it is a different type of action. It's not putting plants in the ground, which has that immediate gratification of seeing a flower that you have just put into the ground and enjoying it, but it is more structural change. And I think we're all learning how important that structural change is to determining what gets done day to day by employees of various organizations. So yeah, parks and schools—great examples of that.

Matthew: Yeah. Thank you. And another thing that people are—many people are involved with now is community science efforts. Gathering information, submitting observations, and so on. Are there opportunities for people to get involved with that, as well?

Ray: Absolutely. Plenty of opportunities for community science. The Western Monarch Milkweed Mapper Project, which is now on iNaturalist. If you live out West, and you see a monarch or you see a milkweed, please go onto iNaturalist look for our iNaturalist project, and enter your data into it. Similarly, we need data all over the country, not just out West, in the center, in the East too, on what flowers monarchs are nectaring at. So we have a Monarch Nectar Plant database. Currently, there's a web portal to enter your data, but in the summer of 2026, we’ll have established an iNaturalist project for you to enter your data there. Of course, iNaturalist, in general, is a phenomenal tool. If you see a cool butterfly, put it on iNaturalist. And I have to give it a plug. I want you to realize the quality of some of the experts who are on iNaturalist reviewing your data. I've seen some bees on my property in Oklahoma. I had no idea what they are, because, you know, I'm a butterfly expert, I'm not a bee expert yet. And so I put the photos of these bees on there. And a gentleman named John Ascher, who I've been told is one of the world's greatest bee experts ever, goes online and tells me what the bees are. And that's so delightful. And it's contributing data, whether it's bees or butterflies, but I'm also learning. I'm learning what I've got. I'm a big fan of efforts like that.

Matthew: And the other thing with iNaturalist is it allows people to contribute from wherever. You mentioned John Ascher, and I can't remember for sure now, but I know certainly at one point, I think he was in Singapore. You know, he's still the world expert. And—. Which means that you in Oklahoma can post your photo, and John, wherever, can see it, and then say, "Yep, this is what it is." Which I just think is an amazing connection to be made.

Kevin: I might just add in a couple of longer running community science efforts, partly just to tout the importance of them to the butterfly research that we've been talking about. The Science paper that came out, the core of the data for that work come from a few different community science efforts. And while they are community science, they are also at the same time still local and regional butterfly experts, many of them, along with regular community members who go out and learn about butterflies in the process. But butterflies, part of what makes them the indicator species for insects is that we know a lot about them because many people really like butterflies. And so a couple of those programs that contributed enormous amounts of information to that report that I want to give credit to—one of them is the North American Butterfly Association. And they have a set of annual counts, once a year, typically, that focus on counting all of the butterflies in a particular area. Many of these programs have been going on for decades. Many of them are in extremely diverse locations like south of Southern Arizona. And many of them are in really important places of habitat change, like in various parts of the Midwest. And those data have been used not only for our work, but our work looking at the effects of pesticides on butterfly communities, in particular, and much other work.

Kevin: And then another organization, or kind of collaborative network, is the North American Butterfly Monitoring Network, which runs a series of programs under what we call the PollardBase network. And these are individuals who go and monitor the same site four or maybe six times through the season. And they walk a route, and they count all of the butterflies that they see in these areas. Many of these programs, again, have been going on for long periods of time. They are managed or completed by regional experts, even though that's not their full-time job. And they've contributed amazing data to understanding butterfly population trends. And so if people are interested in joining a semi-organized, decentralized network, as it were, to look at butterflies in their area, there are opportunities available.

Rachel: Thank you for all those great resources. So I threw this question in here, because I think that the people who are listening to this, I think they already care about butterflies and are probably doing at least one or two of the things that we've talked about. And I think that especially, we, as advocates who are doing the work, we have so much power to influence the people around us that we're in a relationship with, and to spread the word and tell other people about it, and share resources and information—share plants. And so if there's one thing that our listeners can do today to help butterflies, what would you recommend that they do?

Rachel: My answer is go tell someone about this episode, and have them listen to it if they're willing. Because hopefully that will hook them into how cool butterflies are, and that there's something that they can do to help them. You just never know what could come of that. But, yeah, just share this episode with somebody.

Ray: Well, since I'm such a habitat nut, and such a garden nut, I encourage folks to go online and find one of our pollinator plant lists for your area, or maybe our monarch plant list for your area, and try to find at least for starters one plant, one native plant species that you could add to your garden that would help a butterfly. And then see the results. And there's a good chance you're gonna get some cool butterflies showing up thanks to what you planted. So that is a simplistic answer, but something certainly somebody could get started on in one day.

Kevin: I'm gonna follow a similar vein. I think the message that people should take from the similarity here is that this work is not rocket science. It's not anything overly complicated. There's no “secret sauce” that we're not sharing. The answers are available. And so, I'm gonna pull from a publication co-authored in part by our illustrious leader, Scott Black, which, I think, said that the number one thing that anybody can do to support insect populations is to convert turf grass into a native habitat. For a basic homeowner, I'm gonna suggest a strip along the edge of your yard, or next to a sidewalk, and converting that from a section of grass into five to 10 shrubs and smaller plants in there. And I think you'll have done your work. To Ray's point, if you watch that, you will find it is successful, and it will encourage you to do another strip next year. And converting that turf grass into a native habitat, I think, is one of the things everybody can do, assuming they have a yard. I recognize it is a limitation, but I think there's a lot of other strips of land out there that are communal property to all of our citizens. So if it's not a yard, it can be in a park, and so on.

Matthew: Oh boy, this has been so much fun. Thank you, Kevin. Thank you, Ray. I have, as with every Bug Banter, I've one: enjoyed it, and two: I've learned something fresh. So I really appreciate the time today to sit down, and for you to share your knowledge and your enthusiasm. So that's been really great. As you know, we love to wrap up with two questions. And you've both been on before, so we've had to come up with new questions. But the first question is: what has been your favorite experience with a butterfly?

Kevin: I am gonna maybe spin the question on its head and just say that I have had the chance, like I said, to raise a good number of caterpillars, not as many as my wife has, but raising caterpillars gives you an extraordinary appreciation for the rest of the butterfly life cycle. It is an extremely slow lab experiment, right? They start out very, very tiny. It takes a while for them to grow big. It's very detail-oriented because everything that happens to them is smaller than it is for us. And so you get a different perspective spatially and temporally on what it takes to survive. But then most importantly—I think we've talked about how much caterpillars eat on the landscape, and their role eating native plants—and nothing will let you know how much a caterpillar eats except to try and raise it. We traveled a lot collecting plants for caterpillars to eat back in the lab. And it really gives you an appreciation for just how much they're eating across the landscape when you look out at the plants that you see. So I really appreciated that.

Ray: So I've had the time to think of my favorite butterfly experience. And I think it's the butterfly that I captured in my farm last year. And I placed a little transmitter on it, a little radio transmitter, and released it on the farm with some help of some friends. And it stayed on the farm nectaring at the wildflowers that I had intentionally planted for monarchs. It stayed there for a few days. And then when the wind turned to the proper direction so that it could fly to Mexico, it did. All the way through Oklahoma, and Texas, through most of Mexico. Until it reached the overwintering colonies in Mexico. And I was able to keep track of it on a free app, the Project Monarch Science app. And it got there sometime in early November. In early March it was still there. And then on March 8th it departed Mexico and flew up to Texas. And then quickly went from Texas through Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, and Florida. And just to track an individual butterfly, and to realize all that butterfly had seen and experienced, it's pretty, pretty awe-inspiring that—what they're capable of. And makes me love butterflies even more.

Rachel: That's amazing. I love both of those stories. Thank you so much.

Matthew: And I just wanted to say, Ray, that I'd heard about this butterfly of yours before, and I thought it was so funny that it ended up in Florida. Knowing your really close connection with monarchs in Florida. It started in Oklahoma—.

Ray: Yes.

Matthew: –on your land. And ended up in Florida. What were the chances of that?

Ray: We did not expect that at all. And I was actually headed to Florida—North Florida—about the same time it was heading to North Florida. I have to confess that it then—it spent about a day in Florida, then went back up into Georgia. It's not a sad note, just a sign of how adventurous that butterfly is.

Rachel: That's amazing. Thank you for sharing that. So our last question: What is your favorite book or other resource you would recommend on invertebrates?

Kevin: I have a couple things that I set aside here. I have a couple field guides that are, like, my go-to field guides, but I'm actually not gonna suggest that. Although that could be fun if people wanna know butterflies. But I'm gonna stick more to like, stories, and anecdotes, and things like that. So the first one that I have is this Field Guide to Butterflies of the San Francisco Bay and Sacramento Valley Regions, co-authored mainly by Art Shapiro. And Art Shapiro is one of California's longest running butterfly gurus. You'll find his name scattered across news articles for decades. He has started, and partially maintains, one of the longest running butterfly monitoring protocols in the world. And he has spent decades studying the, actually kind of the fun parts of butterfly biology for individuals to see, like when they're there, and how often they're there, and what their colors are, and how it changes through the season, and things. And he has a really nice set—the introduction to this book is, you know, 40 or 50 pages of wonderful natural history about butterfly migrations, butterfly food, and so on. So just a lot of really good reading in the beginning of this.

Kevin: And then the other one is totally different. I don't know of any other regional field guide to ladybugs. It's been an amazing ladybug year where I'm at, and so that's partly why I went for this year. And it's—. One of the things I like about it, it's authored by a fellow named John Acorn, and one of the things he has is at the beginning of each species, he has a little couplet poem talking about the ladybug. And so that sort of, like, combination of science and literature, science and art, all that sort of stuff—love that stuff. And so he's a hoot to read. It's a really fun book. And a group of insects that don't always get a ton of attention, but they're really easy to observe. So I would encourage people to pick this up if they're interested.

Ray: In my case, my favorite book on invertebrates is focused on pollinators, and that is a Xerces Society book, Attracting Native Pollinators. And it's—it is awesome. It is beautiful. It both tells you about the pollinators, but also tells you what they need, and how to help them. I'm a huge fan of that book. I don't have a copy of it at the moment. I had it, and of course, as my coworkers know, my house burned down in a wildfire last year, and I haven't rebuilt my library. But fantastic book. And a book that I need to get back in my library sometime soon. 
And then I am a huge fan, as mentioned earlier, of iNaturalist and how much we can learn from that. And so for those of you who haven't tried it, go out, A: get the app, get the free app. And then go out and take a picture of anything, any living thing. A plant, a slug, mushroom, beetle, bug, fly, butterfly, and post it. And then you'll see why we like it so much. You’ll see why it's so educational. Such a good way to learn and contribute to science at the same time

Rachel: Thank you both so much. You know, Ray, I—before my interview for this job, you recommended that I read Attracting Native Pollinators. And I did not have a background in entomology coming into this position. And because I read that book, I was able to answer a very difficult question in my interview correctly. And I was like, "Oh, thank you, Ray, for recommending that I read this book." It is a great book, and we definitely need to send you a replacement.

Ray: How do you think I'm able to do my job? I read the book.

Rachel: Well, thank you both so much. Most episodes my cheeks hurt a little, but they hurt a lot right now because I've been smiling so much. I just have learned so much information, as Matthew said. We've had you on here before, but every time I learn something new. And I feel so motivated to go rip up a strip of my lawn right now. Haha. But thank you both so much for your time today, your expertise, and your clear passion for butterflies, and all the work that you're doing out there to save these just amazing animals. So, thank you. It's just been a pleasure.

Kevin: Yeah, thanks for bringing the topic up for us. We appreciate it.

Ray: Yeah. And our pleasure to be on here. And our—. I think Kevin and I, as all Xerces Society employees feel, I think, very lucky to have the honor to be trusted with invertebrate conservation. It's really, it's really a passion of ours, everybody at Xerces. And it's fun work, and I'm very lucky to be able to do it.

Rachel: Bug Banter is brought to you by the Xerces Society, a donor-based nonprofit that is working to protect insects and other invertebrates—the life that sustains us.

Rachel: If you are already a donor, thank you so much. If you want to support our work, go to xerces.org/donate. For information about this podcast or for show notes, go to xerces.org/bugbanter.