Cape May Point Arts and Science Center, Cellular Tracking Technology sending team
CAPE MAY POINT — After reaching a historic milestone this past fall by conducting the most comprehensive tracking study of monarch butterfly migration ever, a delegation comprising representatives from the Cape May Point Arts and Science Center and Cellular Tracking Technologies is headed to Angangueo, Michoacán, Mexico, for further research opportunities.
The CMPASC and CTT have collaborated since 2021, when they began Project Monarch — a local initiative to use test transmitters to track butterflies as they travel thousands of miles to Mexico to overwinter.
CMPASC President Bob Mullock said the reason to head to Mexico this February is two-fold.
“It’s critically important [to study] the science of monarch butterflies because of their 80 percent reduction in numbers over the past decade or so,” Mullock said. “[Secondly], to ascertain their migration paths, so [we know where] to establish protection areas and pollinator gardens.”
The team traveling to Mexico includes Mullock, CTT CEO Michael Lanzone, CTT research and development scientist Sean Burcher (who is also science director at CMPASC) and CTT Vice President of Global Marketing Development David La Puma. Martin Fiedler, a videographer, will also join the team.
“We’ll be joined by both Mexican experts and university experts who partner with Project Monarch,” Mullock said. “Including Canadian and German representatives, and other media who are not officially part of the team but are welcomed interested parties to the study.”
Prior to the group trip, Mullock said he had previously visited Angangueo as part of an advanced team to check out the mountains and find the best place to see the monarch clusters.
“We also established relationships with some of the people that will be acting as guides for our team once we get there in the coming week,” Mullock added.
The trip marks the first time four scientists will visit Angangueo, a town adjacent to the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve World Heritage Site. The area is known for the overwintering concentration of monarch butterflies.
Mullock said the team will head to the mountains, just four hours outside Mexico City, and climb 8,000 to 10,000 feet to where the monarchs cluster.
He hopes they will be able to install transmitters on the monarchs, which could potentially return to the U.S. and perhaps even Cape May Point.
Mullock added that the team has extensive experience placing transmitters on butterflies at CMPASC, but this would be the first time the team would do so in Mexico.
While in Angangueo, the team will connect with Estela Romero Vásquez, a fifth-generation resident. CMPASC has partnered with Vásquez for presentations on what monarch butterflies mean locally, not only scientifically, but culturally.
“We spent a good amount of time talking to Estela and the people she introduced us to, about stories of monarch butterflies and what it means to the communities there,” Mullock said. “[It has] an economic impact, people coming to visit, and culturally it’s a relationship to the Day of the Dead, honoring and remembering their ancestors.”
The trip and experience will be recorded by Fiedler for future CMPASC and CTT content.
“It will be a combined effort to see not only the beauty of the monarch butterflies, the endurance of the monarchs, but also the impact it has on the communities,” Mullock said. “I think that’s a lesson for the rest of the world, beyond the scientific [implications], which is the cultural.”
Mullock added that he hopes the team will gather information on how monarchs are affected by wind, ocean currents and the environment.
“And as a warning to all of us, the importance of protecting ourselves by protecting the environment,” he said. “It’s some of the things we expect to do on this trip.”
Mullock said the team will be using CTT’s Terra Station technology, which allows users to track any animal or insect equipped with a tracking device. The technology can also automatically identify bird and animal sounds.
“We will donate two of those Terra units to schools in the nearby villages in town,” he said. “These communities can enjoy their own identification of birds, butterflies and anything else going through their area of migration.”
The team also plans to establish a painting program in the area schools, allowing students to submit drawings of monarch butterflies. Mullock said they will establish award categories and then post the winners on the CMPASC website.
“We wanted to let them express the importance of the monarch butterflies in a more international way,” he said. “[It will include] the cultural aspect of monarch butterflies and other migrations that take place in their area.”
Mullock emphasized that it was very important for the team to learn lessons from the locals, both scientifically and culturally.
Project Monarch
The overarching goal of Project Monarch is to increase populations. The information gathered by the organizations has provided formerly unknown information about the migration process.
This past fall, 500 monarch butterflies were tagged with ultralight BluMorpho and Blu+ transmitters, allowing the scientists to gather individual-level data on migration navigation.
“It’s just an honor for us to be involved in this worldwide breakthrough,” Mullock said at the time. “Not only tracking monarchs, but so many different species and animals around the world.”
CTT has refined its deployment of monarch transmitters over the past three years. Individual monarchs are caught for tagging and are safely immobilized to add the ultralight tracker, which is done with eyelash glue. After a few minutes, the glue is set and the monarchs are released.
“We just can’t say enough about our partnership with Cellular Tracking Technologies and the technology and developments they’ve made available to us here at the Cape May Point Arts and Science Center,” Mullock said.
CMPASC purchased the first BlueMorpho tag ever placed on an animal, which occurred in the CMPASC courtyard during a tagging demonstration. As part of Project Monarch, there is an app that smartphone users can download to follow butterflies tagged with tracking devices.
By RACHEL SHUBIN/Special to the Star and Wave
