Monarchs Need Your Help!

You have probably heard that monarch butterfly numbers have declined drastically in recent years, and that milkweed loss is one of the main reasons. Monarch Watch is the leader in habitat restoration for monarchs. In 2005, we initiated the Monarch Waystation program to encourage people to grow milkweeds and nectar plants for monarchs. Today there are more than 54 thousand Monarch Waystations in 49 US states (plus DC), 9 Canadian provinces, and 11 additional countries/territories worldwide. 

We also have two free milkweed programs to get more milkweed plants in the ground. Volunteers donate milkweed seed, which we send to our partner nurseries across the country to produce milkweeds. These milkweed plugs are used for our free milkweed for restoration sites and free milkweed for schools programs. Through these programs we have distributed more than 1 million milkweed plants since 2010. These efforts have been funded by contributions from concerned people, other non-profits and corporations. Your contributions will allow us to expand our efforts to create more habitats for monarchs. 

Your One Day One KU donation will be used to:

• Provide free native milkweeds to schools, educational nonprofits, and habitat-restoration projects.
• Develop and distribute new educational resources and support monarch tagging.

Monarch Watch is also a leader in research and outreach. We hosted the International Monarch Science Symposium last year, welcoming more than 150 people who listened to talks by 45 scientists from three continents and five countries and viewed another 23 poster presentations. More than 30 years of Monarch Watch tagging with community scientists has informed much of what we know about the monarch’s fall migration. We participated in the Project Monarch Collaboration to deploy solar radio tags on monarchs. We followed along with many of you as the monarchs that we tagged at Monarch Watch headquarters in Kansas made their way to the overwintering sanctuaries in central Mexico and started heading back north this spring. All of this is only possible with your support. Thank you!