Butterfly scandal?
Paul Cherubini
monarch at saber.net
Wed Mar 21 00:55:42 EST 2001
Jeroen Mentens wrote:
> I wouldn't call it a scandal. everybody can make mistakes
How often? Almost every winter the same enviromentalists go to the Associated
Press, Reuters and the New York Times with monarch disaster stories which
later turn out to be "mistaken".
Example:
Date: 01/03/96 Time: 08:46 Snow and Cold Kill Monarch Butterflies
in Mexico
MEXICO CITY (AP) Snowfall and a cold snap have killed millions of
monarch butterflies at their wintering grounds in mountainous western
Mexico. A preliminary survey of the butterfly sanctuaries by researchers
indicates at least 30 percent of the 50 million to 60 million monarchs that
migrated there from the United States and Canada perished, a leading
environmentalist said Tuesday. ``This is just devastating,'' said Homero
Aridjis, leader of the Group of 100 environmental lobby. `
And in the New York Times on Friday, Jan. 26, 1996
HOMERO ARIDJIS and LINCOLN P. BROWER wrote:
"As many as 30 million monarch butterflies died after a snowstorm
hit their sanctuaries in central Mexico on Dec. 30, [1995]"
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED: ``Some of them have died but
it's only 8 percent maximum,'' said Homero Gomez, an agricultural engineer
interviewed by the Mexican news network Televisa.
And according to another report
http://www.monarchwatch.org/dplex/1996/Apr9612.html
"Eneida Montesinos Patino and Eduardo Rendon Salinas, our Mexican
student researchers, have hard numbers: Only 6 to 7% of the butterflies
were killed by the late December, 1995 snowstorm."
Paul Cherubini, Placerville, Calif.
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