Symbols of Freedom and Beauty
Excerpt from The Scientist, a novel about climate change awareness:
“Now it was their junior year in high school, the three amigos were settled in on their favorite retreat, Gobblers Peak, taking in a rare morning, watching hundreds of little winged specimens as they gracefully bounced from here to there. Noah, perfectly still, was adorned in a fluttering costume that Ian thought would lift his pal out of his boots. Ian and Annie tried to figure out how Noah could stay motionless for so long. ‘Where are they born and how long do they live?’ Ian asked. Noah, who had always kept his scientific knowledge to himself, opened up in a delivery never witnessed. ‘The Lepidoptera goes through a complete metamorphosis beginning with its ovum stage that hatches to the larva, or caterpillar, with numerous prolegs. The first exoskeleton develops, which molts into a larger exoskeleton only to break open and reveal pupa. Once the chrysalis splits, the butterfly emerges and -’ ‘I’m sorry I asked. All I know is I thought butter couldn’t fly.’”
Annie, Ian, and I had great fun that long ago day, enjoying the beauties that have fossils dating back about 56 million years. Butterflies have appeared in 3500-year-old Egyptian art and have stayed with us ever since. They are so highly revered that 28 of our states have them as designated insects, or simply identified as the state butterfly. There are over 18,500 species worldwide. The most renowned in the USA is the native monarch. The distinct orange hue and white spots lining their wings are also found in Australia and New Zealand. Migration is critical to their survival as our eastern monarchs fly over 3,000 miles to Mexico, and then travel back home. But the British painted lady sets the record with its 9,000 mi round trip journey from tropical Africa to the Arctic Circle while repopulating six generations. Fascinating that such fragile flying magnificence can make that happen!
Beautiful butterflies use a time-compensated sun compass to navigate their lives, and depending on the species, a lifetime can last from a week to almost a year. To become valuable pollinators for certain plants, their basic diet consists of flower nectar while camouflage acts as a safety net against predators. If you have access to a butterfly garden, think of planting the feathery dill foliage because it will attract the winged flying charmers who will feed on the aromatic leaves.
Butterflies fly when the temperature is around a comfortable 81 degrees Fahrenheit or higher - but not too high. And please avoid using pesticides in or anywhere close to your butterfly-magnet garden. And there lies an unavoidable danger. A recently released research study brings us alarming news. As rapidly decreasing insect populations around the world mount up, the butterfly decline is most evident. Due to an overabundance of pesticide use, vegetation loss, and global warming, the U.S. butterfly population has decreased by 22% between 2000 and 2020. This scientific conclusion was drawn from 35 different monitoring programs involving 12.6 million butterflies of 554 different species. Thirteen times more species decreased in number than increased with 107 species losing over half their numbers. This is a major loss in the insect world because these little fluttering works of art contribute so much to pollination, the cycling of nutrients, and food webs for the miniature environment sector.
With Earth continuing to warm and extreme weather hitting more often, it is difficult to guess how many fewer of these creatures there will be over the next twenty years in backyards and across meadows. While these important contributors to ecological balance are so vital, so are another symbol of our freedom - native bees. Beautiful in their own right, around 52% of these wild plant pollinators are dying off, while the American bumble bee population has declined by about 90% during the past two decades. Both of these speedy buzzing insects now have to fight off non-native invasive bees, and avoid new diseases and parasites that weren’t prevalent not long ago.
Back to the monarchs. People are alarmed by the thought of losing the decorated flights of tranquility and folks everywhere are stepping up. Nowhere more noticeable than the Central Texas town of Leander where the citizens fully realize the monarch flights are quite small compared to decades ago. There, the black and orange colors frequent a six-mile-long stretch of attractive roadway adorned with grassy borders where the favorite plant for the monarch caterpillar thrives, the native milkweed. Since that flowering plant is the monarch’s number one reproducing foliage, there will be no mowing of grass until the butterflies depart in June. Ditto for when the welcomed wings return in the fall.
More excellent news! The World Wildlife Fund reported on 3/15/2025, that the population of the Eastern monarchs arriving in Mexico’s overwintering locale nearly doubled this past winter when compared to the year before. Unusual, favorable weather conditions along their flying route are what made this possible. Even though the numbers are far beneath the long-term average, this is a great step for Mother Nature.
Another dashing example of nature’s freedom and beauty is the heralded hummingbird. Fossils of these biological marvels were discovered in southern Germany about 30 years ago in rocks, yet today almost all of the 300+ species live in Central and South America. The hovering and fluttering of their 50 mph wing speed is being witnessed less and less in the U.S.A. as a wide range of hazards and threats have decimated the hummingbird count. Not only is extreme weather a factor, but the windows of highrise buildings, domestic cats, toxins, and disappearing flowering plants are forcing conservationists to concentrate on hummingbird health.
Native flowering plants that offer red, orange, and yellow shades of color, such as the native Golden Alexander, will attract more of these tiny birds to your garden. Sipping water is nice, but flowers are this wildlife’s best source for nectar. If you are fortunate enough to have access to open woods, meadows, or low grassy parcels that have moist soils, throw some native flower seeds around year after year. Butterflies, bees, and hummingbirds will flourish thanks to you.
They once had their cornerstone in America’s environment, but now these flying symbols of freedom and beauty are not so common - for all the familiar reasons relating to humanity’s lack of ability to stay out of the way.
In fact, per a recent sweeping conservation report, since 1968, almost half of the U.S. Western bird habitat, including the iconic cactus wren, has been displaced for all the stated sad reasons. Please look into nature’s preservation organizations in your area and find time to volunteer.
By joining others who think alike, perhaps one day you might be part of resurrecting a portion of our endangered wildlife.
How good would that feel?