The Mystery of the Monarchs

 

Monarch butterflies are not only beautiful, they also demonstrate the wisdom of God by their amazing migration.  It is something impressive when a small bird navigates many miles to arrive at just the right destination.  But the Monarch is even more awe inspiring because its trip involves multiple generations and even the creation of Super Butterflies.   It’s a story that begins when a butterfly lays an egg on a milkweed plant on a Spring day in Texas or Oklahoma.

The mother butterfly always chooses milkweed because the caterpillar that will be born eats only the leaves of milkweed.  It’s a plant that has such a bitter taste that grazing animals will leave it alone and it also means that the caterpillar itself tastes yucky to most potential predators.

After munching on leaves for several weeks and growing rapidly the caterpillar forms a chrysalis and two weeks later a new Monarch will emerge.  As Spring turns into Summer, the flowers that produce nectar for Monarchs will begin to dry up, which means that it’s time to head North.  How does it know which direction is North?  Not sure about that (and neither is anyone else).

The Monarch will only live for a little over a month, which limits the distance it can cover, so it will find another milkweed plant and lay eggs that will produce a second generation.   The process will be repeated until there is a third generation of butterfly that will arrive in places like Ontario, New York, Michigan, Wisconsin or Minnesota.  That’s when the fourth generation will be born, the Super Butterflies.  This generation will be bigger, stronger and will live eight or nine months.

As Summer turns to Fall, the Monarch begins to store fat to prepare for a long trip.  It will fly South and keep flying until it reaches the Mariposa Monarca Biosphere Reserve in the mountains of Mexico, a distance of up to 3,000 miles.  These butterflies that were born in a variety of Northern states will always navigate to the same place, a place they have never seen.  The trees are so thick with Monarchs that they look like they have orange, yellow and black leaves.  They will gather to spend the Winter and then in February or March they will head north to begin the cycle one more time.

Yes, I know that there are some who would consider their story and conclude that evolution is so amazing that it provided these lucky insects DNA that somehow gives them a built in compass and somehow directs every fourth generation to be “Super” and somehow points them to the right spot in Mexico at the right time.  The plain truth is that there is no way the theory of evolution plus time plus blind chance can begin to explain the migration of the Monarch.  It’s far more reasonable to say, as the psalmist once did, “He commanded and they were created.”  (Psalm 148:5)