Texas Fauna Project

Monarch Butterfly

See Full Interview Transcript

Based in Alpine, Hal Flanders was a Big Bend naturalist and guide. Here he recalls tracking the monarch butterfly to its winter range in the oyamel fir forests west of Mexico City. He was entranced by the butterfly's immense migration and the resourcefulness of the birds that preyed on them despite their milkweed chemical defenses. He was also dismayed by the greed of local oyamel fir lumbermen and the blindness of the public to the key role of pollinators in our food supply.