Chattahoochee Nature Center joins state agency to help monitor wintering butterflies

Now through Mar. 1, the Roswell-based Chattahoochee Nature Center is asking for the public’s help with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources’ efforts to count wintering monarch butterflies.

While thousands of monarch butterflies travel to Mexico each year to avoid cold temperatures, not all do. Some remain in the southeast.

Sonia Altizer, a University of Georgia ecology professor and director of Project Monarch Health, said information collected by the public can help scientists understand how and why some monarchs breed throughout the winter in the south and if “overwintering as non-breeding adults in the southern U.S. might affect future population numbers.”