2019 Western Monarch Thanksgiving Count Chart

According to Xerces Society Western Monarch Count: "After painstakingly documenting overwintering monarchs at 240 sites along the coast of California this fall, volunteers with the Western Monarch Thanksgiving Count reported 29,418 monarchs—less than 1% of the population in the 1980s and nearly identical to last year’s all-time low. Bottom line: The western monarch population remains at a critical level...." Read the full blog post here. 

According to a recent blog post: "Of the 117 overwintering sites which were monitored by volunteers during both Thanksgiving and New Year’s, 56 sites' numbers declined, 25 sites increased, one site remained unchanged, and 35 sites hosted zero butterflies during both counts. In total, of the sites counted, we saw an average decline of 46% between Thanksgiving and New Year's count periods. This is comparable to the past three years of New Year's monitoring which have ranged between 38-49% average decline....Please see this blog post announcing the results from the New Year's Count." Read the full blog post here.