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WJU Employee Saving Monarch Butterflies

Tagg Began Raising Butterflies After Taking Naturalist Class

Wheeling Jesuit University employee Kathy Tagg shows off a monarch butterfly she has raised and tagged at her home.

WHEELING — Milkweed does a monarch butterfly good, and it’s serving as a vital tool as a Wheeling Jesuit University employee raises, releases and helps re-establish the disappearing butterfly species in the area.

Kathy Tagg serves as director of disability services at WJU, but her side interest is saving the monarch butterfly. She learned what she knows about caring for the species through a West Virginia Master Naturalist class taught by former Oglebay Park Good Zoo Director Penny Miller.

“She taught us about the life cycle of the monarch, and how there is not enough food for them to eat,” Tagg said of Miller. “They eat only milkweed plants, and they only lay eggs on the milkweed leaves. ”

This past summer, Tagg raised 104 monarch butterflies in her home, and she placed a paper tag on each of their wings to track their annual fall journey to Mexico for the winter. The tags were obtained from the Monarch Watch research group.

“If the monarch dies and someone finds the tag, they can contact Monarch Watch and we’ll see how far it has gone,” Tagg said.

The lifespan of a monarch butterfly is about six to nine weeks, although those on the path to Mexico can live longer.

Researchers have concluded the monarch population has declined by at least 80 percent over the past 20 years. The Center for Biological Diversity reports the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is now legally bound to determine whether to protect monarch butterflies under the Endangered Species Act, and a decision on the matter is expected before 2019.

Tagg found 104 eggs this summer growing on milkweed in her yard. She continued to feed them the same nourishment after she brought them inside her home.

The eggs don’t survive in the wild, she said, noting they are disturbed by weather and such environmental factors as mowing.

“And there’s such a lack of milkweed now,” Tagg said. “Farmers and others are using herbicide to kill it because they regard it as a weed.”

Tagg creates a habitat for each egg inside a plastic container where she places milkweed. She keeps the containers moist by placing a paper towel sprayed with water on the bottom of the container.

The transformation from egg to caterpillar to monarch butterfly takes about a month, and all along the caterpillar gets its nourishment from milkweed. Tagg feeds them twice a day, and at their largest they will be about 4 centimeters long.

When they emerge from the chrysalis they attach themselves to the top of the container.

“Then I take them outside, open the lid, and they fly away,” Tagg said.

She encourages everyone to plant milkweed for the monarchs. Seeds can be grown not just in a yard, but in a pot on a balcony or a bed in a school yard.

“It’s a nice way for children to learn about the life cycle, because the monarch butterfly’s cycle is similar to our own,” Tagg said. “We start as an egg, and form into a human being.”

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