Flights of Fancy
The Marvelo of Monarch Migration
Can you imagine walking 50 to 100 miles in a day? That’s how far monarch butterflies fly every day, as they make their 3000 mile tour north. Even covering that much ground each day, this flight takes so long, it cannot be done in a single generation. It takes the lifetimes of up to 4 monarchs to reach the northern US and Canada.1 That is why it is so crucial that they are able to find gardens with nectar rich flowers to refuel and milkweed nurseries to bear the next generation of monarchs.
This is Marvelo, Maribelle, & Margarite – I named them
Milkweed is the sole host plant of the monarch butterfly. Meaning it is the only plant on which they can lay their eggs and their young can successfully hatch and grow as caterpillars. Milkweed is critical to monarch reproduction, but milkweed alone is not enough.
Side Quest
Monarchs are headed this way as we speak! You can track their progress here.
Bitter Pills & Acquired Tastes
Monarch caterpillars happily much along on milkweed leaves. As they do it imbues the larval butterflies with the toxin produced in the plants milky sap. This helps both monarch caterpillars and adult butterflies to be less appealing to predators, like birds. It’s sort of like monarchs are superheroes and milkweed nurseries are their origin story. Don’t go thinking you can go all ‘Peter Parker and a spider’ on milkweed though. Milkweed sap is not good to eat for humans, as well as many other animals and insects, but that’s great for monarchs.2 That is what makes the juiced-up monarchs an unappealing snack to predators. Though milkweed does kind of give monarchs superpowers, it’s more likely to give you a stomachache.
As they transform into adult butterflies however, their tastes change. While adult monarchs will drink the nectar of milkweed plants, it is not their only, or necessarily even their favorite, food source. As the blooms of milkweed only last for 3-4 weeks of the summer, it is important to have a variety of flowers that bloom at different times throughout the season. Doing so can help to ensure there are always ample nectar sources for monarchs and other butterflies to feed on. They feed on the nectar of many types of flowers. Some of their favorites include echinacea, asters, and bee balm.
They are also fond of alyssum and pansies, which are important early spring bloomers. They help to sustain the monarchs until the bounty of summer bursts into bloom.
Nectar rich flowers that continue to bloom into fall, such as calendula, gaillardia, salvia, and blazing star are especially important. These flowers will fuel the 4th generation of the monarch as they alone make the entire trans-continental flight south to over winter along the southern United Sates coasts and oyamel fir forests of Mexico.
You can find seed for milkweed and all of our other pollinator favorites here.
- U.S. Forest Service. [n.d.]. Migration and Overwintering. https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/pollinators/Monarch_Butterfly/migration/index.shtml [Online; accessed 3-April-2026]. ↩︎
- U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. [n.d.]. Spreading Milkweed, Not Myths. (2021). https://www.fws.gov/story/spreading-milkweed-not-myths ↩︎
