CT Audubon in the news: “You can change your gardens” to help Monarch butterflies

A monarch feeds on milkweed flowers.

August 20, 2024—Alisha Milardo, director of Connecticut Audubon’s Roger Tory Peterson Estuary Center in Old Lyme, appeared on Fox61 TV to talk about disappearing monarch butterflies and about Connecticut Audubon’s work to reduce pesticides.

Connecticut residents can help by eliminating or reducing the pesticides they use on their own properties, she said. And they can make their yards more welcoming for these migratory butterflies.

“You can change your gardens to be a little more nutritious and to be a better habitat for them when they’re here,” she said.

Nationwide, monarch numbers are way down. The Center for Biological Diversity reports that “these butterflies, once a familiar sight, are plummeting toward extinction due to landscape-scale threats from pesticides, development and climate change.”

A study published in June showed that the use of neonicotinoid pesticides on midwestern farms was a significant cause of the decline of monarch populations.

Here’s the full interview: