Pacific Grove Prunes Monarch Cluster Trees

[Roger Kuhlman]

Yeah but its eucalyptus (gasp! it is a non-native plant.) and it's not politically correct to work carefully or save this plant under any circumstances.

 

Definitely an interesting story with some intriguing hyphotheses advanced. I hope a follow-up study of the effects of this work for future continuing Monarch populations in the Pacific Groves sanctuary is done.

 

Roger Kuhlman

Ann Arbor, Michigan

 
> Date: Tue, 1 Dec 2009 10:15:57 -0800
> From: monarch at saber.net
> To: tils-leps-talk at yahoogroups.com
> CC: LEPS-L at lists.yale.edu
> Subject: Pacific Grove Prunes Monarch Cluster Trees
> 
> PACIFIC GROVE TREE TRIMMING MIGHT HAVE CAUSED LOW
> MONARCH TURNOUT
> By Kera Abraham Nov. 19, 2009 http://tinyurl.com/ydo6f2f
> 
> In a city nicknamed Butterfly Town, USA ­ where an annual
> Butterfly Parade marks the beginning of the monarch overwintering
> season, and tourists flock to visit the famous Butterfly House ­ the
> absence of thousands of orange-and-black-winged annual visitors
> is something of an identity crisis.
> 
> "If Butterfly Town loses its monarchs ­ not good," says Pat Herrgott,
> a long-time volunteer docent at Pacific Grove's Monarch Grove Sanctuary.
> 
> The sanctuary is low on butterflies this year, and some monarch
> enthusiasts suspect that the city's heavy-handed trimming of > branches is to blame.
> 
> "It was obvious to me this amount of pruning will substantially degrade
> the suitability of the sanctuary as a cluster site, "entomologist Paul
> Cherubini wrote on a monarch listserv in late October. "The butterfly
> population is likely to be substantially lower and less stable this year
> and for years to come."
> 
> P.G. Public Works Director Celia Perez Martinez says the trimming
> was done for public safety in late September, before the Oct. 1 start
> of monarch overwintering season. (In 2004 an 85-year-old woman
> was killed by a falling branch while visiting the sanctuary; the city
> settled with her family for $1 million.)
> 
> "Eucalyptus trees are very vulnerable to limb breakage," she says.
> "[But] we would not have trimmed any branches that had butterflies
> on them."
> 
> City arborist Rick Katen directed a tree service on which branches
> to cut, Perez Martinez says, but the city didn't document the work.
> "In the future we1ll do that, but we've never done it in the past,"
> she says.
> 
> This year's low butterfly numbers could be caused by any number
> of things, she says, including October's storms: "They could have
> gone to Santa Cruz for all we know."
> 
> Dr. Francis Villablanca of Cal Poly is tasked with reviewing the
> monarch count data. "At the current time we do not know if the
> P.G. Sanctuary population count is low because of something
> peculiar to this site (e.g.: tree trimming), or if the populations
> are low range-wide and across all sites," he wrote in an e-mail
> to Perez Martinez.
> 
> Villablanca expects to have some findings within the next few
> weeks. "I would call for calm minds to prevail until we have
> some data," he wrote. "The story will make itself evident."
> 
> But Bob Pacelli, who has been filming P.G.'s monarchs for
> two decades, has a strong hunch that the trimming messed
> up the particular microclimate ­ humidity, temperature, precipitation
> and wind shelter ­ that makes the P.G. sanctuary a critical
> overwintering site.
> 
> Last year at this time, he says, the monarch clusters were dense.
> This year he could barely spot any butterflies. "Every single place
> that the monarchs could hang onto is gone," he says morosely.
> "I hope I'm totally wrong, but in my heart I know it's not true.
> No more butterflies. Oof."
> =========================================
> ANNUAL BUTTERFLY COUNT SHOWS DRAMATIC DECLINE IN PACIFIC
> GROVE'S MONARCH GROVE SANCTUARY
> By Kera Abraham November 30, 2009 http://tinyurl.com/yhjf5t6
> 
> An annual count of monarch butterflies shows dramatically low
> turnout at Pacific Grove's Monarch Grove Sanctuary this year,
> confirming the suspicions of monarch enthusiasts who blame
> heavy tree pruning done by the city in late September.
> 
> According to El Dorado-based entomologist Paul Cherubini, this
> year's monarch population estimates, as compared to
> Thanksgiving 2008, are:
> 
> Up 34 percent in Santa Cruz's Lighthouse Field State Park;
> Down 38 percent at Moran Lake, Capitola;
> Down 34 percent at a private property near Big Sur:
> Down 96 percent at P.G.'s Monarch Grove Sanctuary.
> 
> Cherubini blames the disproportionate decline in the P.G. sanctuary
> on the trimming. He predicts that the butterflies will abandon the
> sanctuary between mid-December and mid-January, and may not
> return to it as a regular overwintering spot.
> 
> "The city itself inadvertently ruined its own butterfly habitat via
> the tree pruning," Cherubini writes by email. "The city could have
> used tree rope or wire cables to secure the dangerous branches
> instead of cutting them."
> 
> City Public Works Director Celia Perez Martinez has said that the
> low butterfly turnout this year could be due to any number of
> factors besides the trimming. She is awaiting a more comprehensive
> assessment by Cal Poly professor Francis Villablanca.
> 
> The relative absence of butterflies in P.G. comes in the context of
> what appears to be a long-term decline in the western monarch
> population, which may be caused by a variety of factors, including
> summer droughts, invasive parasites, habitat degradation and the
> disappearance of the Central Valley's native milkweed, the only
> plant on which monarchs will lay their eggs.
> 
> 
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