The great Monarch mystery is: How do inexperienced Monarchs from Colorado to New England and the Canadian provinces all find the same traditional roosts in Mexico each year? What environmental information is used by Monarchs to guide their migratory flights? Do they use the sun as a compass, are they guided by the earth's magnetic field, do they follow structural features of the landscape such as rivers and mountains, or do they use a combination of these, or perhaps some undiscovered method? Because of their small size (0.5 grams), relatively weak flight, and body temperatures which fluctuate with the air temperature, the monarchs' flight and, therefore, the whole migration should be influenced by the weather conditions. And we need to ask: How do weather patterns and climate affect the migration? Once we have the basic information on the effects of these "physical factors", can we use this information to predict when the migrating butterflies will arrive at particular milestones along their migration routes? Can we predict if the migration will move faster or slower in a given year?

In what direction do migrating Monarchs fly?

It seems logical that migrating Monarchs should move in a southwesterly (225 degrees) direction from where they start. But do they? The butterflies recovered from our tagging program have been found in directions ranging from southeast (150 degrees) to northwest (300 degrees) from the point of initial capture and tagging. Even if the Monarchs are observed sometimes to move in a direct southwest direction, though, the migrants don't have an external map to guide them and they themselves have never been to the roost sites so the question remains: how do they "know" which direction to take?

To obtain an answer to this question, we need to consider several possible means the Monarchs could use to find their way. What is the mechanism of orientation used by Monarch butterflies as they migrate from central and eastern United States and Canada to their overwintering sites in Mexico?

There are several possible ways that Monarchs can orient during their migration flights:

• They could orient based on the position of the sun

• They could orient to the earth's magnetic field

• They could orient using features of the landscape

They could use a combination of two or even all three of the above - or - Perhaps they could use some feature of the environment we are not yet aware of Each of these possible explanations can be considered an alternative hypothesis. And each hypothesis can yield a set of unique predictions. Testing each hypothesis and distinguishing among them will require experiments that, first, identify differences in their predictions and, second, look at the behavior of the experimentally manipulated Monarchs to see which if any of the predictions best matches the behavior.

Before we design experiments to test each alternative hypothesis, we need more information (data) on Monarch navigation in the field. Here is where we need your help: By making systematic records of the directions Monarchs take on their migratory flights, you can help us find some clues to distinguish between the possible answers to this Monarch mystery. Strictly speaking, making natural history observations in the field is different from conducting an experiment since making field observations usually does not involve manipulating any variable. Most of the best designed experiments, however, grow directly out of insights attained while making non-manipulative natural history observations. Our expectation is that your observations in the field will eventually lead to the definitive studies on Monarch orientation.

As you have reviewed the information and worked with Migrating Monarch, you may have come up with some ideas for the factors effecting migration. Your ideas should be added to the growing list of ideas below. These ideas can grow into research questions. Click on the links to read additional research areas submitted by others or respond to a previous research question posted here.
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