Protecting a Royal Refuge

By Jamie Murphy

They begin to arrive a few at a time, bright, familiar butterflies alighting in the upper branches of the gray-green fir trees. But as the month of November wears on, the sky becomes filled with tiny, floating flecks of color. Tens of millions of butterflies descend from the skies, draping entire trees in an astonishing tapestry of black, white and orange.

In one of nature's most impressive pageants, monarch butterflies fly from as far away as Canada to spend the winter in tiny patches of fir forest nestled in the mountains of central Mexico.* Though the butterfly migration has been going on since at least the end of the Pleistocene epoch, 10,000 years ago, the isolated roosts were discovered by zoologists only in 1975. Alarmed by the disappearance of forests around the sites, the Mexican government and private conservation groups have joined forces to protect them. Says University of Florida Zoologist Lincoln Brower: "We're dealing with one of the most fragile as well as limited habitats in North America."

The preservation effort is being spearheaded by Monarca A.C., a nonprofit Mexican organization established in 1980. "When I first saw the monarchs, I became ecstatic and vowed to learn more about them," says Rodolfo Ogarrio, a Harvard-trained lawyer who helped start the group. What Ogarrio discovered was that the butterfly's retreats were threatened by the local farmers, who were gradually clearing the trees for timber and farmland. Says Carlos Gottfried, a co-founder of Monarca: "The forests in the mid-'70s were pristine. A few years later they were receding up the mountain."

The group sought the help of the Mexican government, which in 1980 issued a decree protecting the monarch. But the action did little good, since the land remained unprotected. Last August, howev-

er, Mexico City took a critical step: it officially declared the butterfly's winter domains "ecological preserves." The proclamation prohibits logging and agricultural development within an area of 11,000 acres around the monarch retreats and restricts development in buffer zones that encompass another 28,000 acres. In addition, the Ministry of Ecology bought about 2,000 acres of land where the insects actually cluster.

Since local residents depend on the forest for a livelihood, Monarca and the government are attempting to find ways to diversify the area's economy. They have devised an ambitious program to improve the yield of already existing farmland, establish orchards, build more greenhouses (chrysanthemums are already grown in the region and sold for export) and even start fish- breeding pools. Though the plan is only beginning to be implemented, many environmentalists consider it part of a new chapter in Third World conservation. "Setting aside these sites as reserves is only a first step," says Curtis Freese, director of Latin American and Caribbean programs for the World Wildlife Fund, which has contributed $220,000 to the project. "We must approach habitat protection by asking the larger question: How do you work with the local small farmer and make sure his needs are met while at the same time serve the needs of conservation?"

The butterfly migration, in fact, may turn into an economic boon for the peasants. Last year the locals guided 50,000 sightseers through the region -- for 500 pesos, about 60 cents each. They also conduct a brisk business selling butterfly-motif postcards, posters and tiles supplied to them at cost by Monarca. "Though it seems a very small amount," says Melody Allen, executive director of the Monarch Project, an Oregon-based lobbying organization that concentrates on protecting similar sites in California, "they are charging enough to make more income than they would if they were logging."

Why the monarchs migrate remains a mystery. Of the three to five generations that hatch every year, only the last goes south. Gorging on nectar, monarchs fly up to 100 miles a day. One explanation for the spectacular mass movement is that when the glaciers of the last Ice Age retreated from North America, the butterflies expanded their range northward to exploit new food supplies, and then began migrating to survive the winter. How the butterflies find their winter hideouts is a conundrum as well. An intriguing theory suggests that, like certain species of birds, the monarchs may respond to the earth's magnetism: the Mexican hideaways surround a large iron-ore deposit, which creates a powerful magnetic field.

Come next March the monarchs will stir, begin mating and in a great whirlwind of color set out for the U.S. Six months later, a new generation will fly south, headed for the tiny patches of fir forest that conservationists and Mexican officials hope will be a butterfly refuge for another epoch or two.

FOOTNOTE: *The Mexican refuge, which consists of ten sites in the mountainous Michoacan and Estado de Mexico provinces, attracts monarchs from the eastern two-thirds of North America. Western monarchs migrate to equally small and specific spots along the California coastline.

With reporting by David Bjerklie/New York and Andrea Dabrowski/Mexico City