Community Conservation of Monarch Forest in Mexico

This year begins with exciting news from our local partner Alternare who continues to thrive. In the first trimester four workshops were held: three on how to build fuel-efficient stoves and one to build a cistern at a school In Rondanilla, Michoacan. The former included 36 women and 18 men who created 10 stoves, benefiting nine families and the Donaciano Ojeda elementary school. The latter included six women and 18 men, a wonderful outpouring of community spirit to help make the stoves and cistern a reality. 

Preparations are now in progress for the upcoming reforestation season as well. Communities and schools are doing an outstanding job maintaining their tree nurseries to have all the seedlings for this summer’s reforestation planting ready. We held a workshop with 16 women and 14 men who produced 2,000 pine, oyamel, oak, ash tree seedlings in the 21 nurseries established by Alternare. A total of 31,371 trees are now under the communities’ care. We plan to reforest 16 hectares in the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve’s buffer zone this year and everything looks ready.

The monarchs were late in leaving the overwintering sites in Mexico but they are now heading north to their summer breeding grounds. Preliminary numbers indicate that the monarch population is slowly recovering with increased monarch sightings reported in some parts of Texas. Extended weather forecasts for the northern breeding grounds look favorable and we are all hoping the monarch population will once again expand this year. We’ll keep monitoring their progress as a new generation is born and joins their migration north.

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