Climate Change Could Affect Monarch Butterfly's Migration, Study
Says Cold temperatures trigger the migration patterns, research
shows By Mary Elizabeth Dallas THURSDAY, Feb. 21 (HealthDay
News) -- Global climate change could have a profound impact on
the migration pattern of the monarch butterfly, according to a
new study. These butterflies, which fly 2,000 miles south from
North America to the mountains of Mexico every fall and back
again in the spring, would simply keep flying south if they
didn't feel chilly winter weather, researchers found. The study
was published Feb. 21 in the journal Current Biology. "The
monarchs need the thermal microenvironment at the overwintering
sites for the migration cycle to persist. Without that thermal
stimulus, the annual migration cycle would be broken and we will
have lost one of the most intriguing biological phenomena in the
natural world," explained Steven Reppert of the University of
Massachusetts Medical School, in a journal news release. "This
increased understand