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October marks the culmination of one of nature’s greatest events: The fall migration of the monarch butterfly. But this year, monarchs are more at risk than ever before -- and toxic pesticides are driving them to the brink of extinction. Help save the monarch butterfly: Start your membership with Friends of the Earth with an annual donation NOW!
Western Monarchs have declined by over 99%. They’re at risk of disappearing forever. A key factor in their decline is glyphosate -- a.k.a. Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup.
At Friends of the Earth, we’re working to get this toxic pesticide out of our food system -- but we need your help!
Help save monarchs from Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup: Start your Membership with Friends of the Earth now.
The migration of the monarch butterfly is unlike any other. Each fall, millions of these colorful creatures leave their summer feeding and breeding grounds and travel up to 3,000 miles south to reach their overwintering grounds in Mexico and California. No other insect in the world migrates such a distance to places it has never been before.
The butterflies making their way south today are the great-great-grandchildren of the monarchs that left last spring. It is a team effort -- an epic, intergenerational journey hardwired into their DNA.
This migration is unique, remarkable, and fragile. The monarch is the only butterfly known to make a two-way migration as birds do. But unlike any other great migrators, like birds or caribou, none of these individual butterflies will ever return. Instead, after the winter, they will fly part of the way back north, where they will mate and lay eggs on only one plant: milkweed. There, their eggs will hatch into colorful caterpillars, feed on the milkweed, and transform into butterflies before continuing north, over several generations, and then finish their round trip.
Another thing that makes this migration different from any other is that it is entirely reliant on one plant: milkweed.
But across large swaths of the U.S., milkweed has been wiped out by Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup, and the monarch butterflies that depend on it are being decimated.
Help stop Bayer-Monsanto from driving monarch butterflies to extinction. Start your membership with an annual donation of $10 to Friends of the Earth today.
A new study confirms what we have long feared: milkweed, vital to the survival of the monarchs, is contaminated by toxic pesticides. This study found every single sample of milkweed was contaminated -- scientists found 64 different pesticides, and a third of samples contained pesticides at levels known to be deadly to monarchs.
This poisoning of the only food source for monarch caterpillars is one more devastating factor driving monarchs to the brink of extinction.
For the second year in a row, less than 30,000 western monarchs were sighted in California, down from 1.2 million two decades ago. Current populations are only 1% of what they were in the 1980s. Eastern monarch populations are also nearing the point of no return -- the latest annual count found the number overwintering in Mexico fell by 50% from the prior year. Monarchs are being driven to extinction.
And it’s all for the sake of corporate greed. Big Ag and fossil fuel corporations are driving monarch butterfly decline through pesticide use, climate change, and habitat loss. One of the worst culprits is Bayer-Monsanto’s Roundup®, which is killing off young monarchs’ only food source, milkweed.
We have a plan to turn this around, but we need 200 new members to step up and give annually for monarchs.
Help stop Bayer-Monsanto from driving monarch butterflies to extinction. Start your membership with Friends of the Earth with an annual gift.
At Friends of the Earth, we know how to beat Big Ag and save endangered species. Our strategy includes a nationwide ban on neonics and other toxic pesticides that kill bees and butterflies. At the same time, we’re pushing major grocery companies like Kroger to stop selling food grown with these chemicals. This is the kind of bold campaigning that can shift us away from pesticide-intensive agriculture and make pollinator- and people-friendly organic food available for all.
Our plan has the power to win comprehensive protections for monarch butterflies, people and the planet. But we don’t have much time, and we need your help to get there. We need 200 new members to become annual donors.
Donors are the backbone of our organization. As a donor, your support will allow us to plan ahead, thinking strategically over the long term to maximize our ability to make change. Reliable funding is key to putting our plans into action -- and you’re a critical part of this movement to protect endangered pollinators like monarch butterflies.
Becoming an annual donor is easy and rewarding. Just sign up on our secure online form, and you’ll be automatically charged each year for the donation amount that you choose. Your yearly statement will clearly show your gift.
Plus, when you join as a member, more of your dollar goes directly to funding our programs. And you’ll help ensure that we have the resources to keep fighting in 2021 and over the long term. You’ll get to watch your gift turn into real results -- like protections for monarchs and other pollinators. But to get there, we are calling for 200 new donors by the end of the month. Will you be one of them?
Help save endangered pollinators: Give annually for monarchs with a recurring contribution to Friends of the Earth.
Thank you,
Lisa Archer,
Food and agriculture program director,
Friends of the Earth
