Monarch Butterflies Take On New Life At Moorestown Friends Meetinghouse

MOORESTOWN, NJ — Moorestown residents ages 5 and up recently had the chance to watch monarch butterflies flap their wings for the first time after emerging from their cocoons. Participants used a magnifying lens to get a close-up look at live eggs, caterpillars, and chrysalises—the light wraps in which full-grown caterpillars transform themselves into butterflies.

Marlton residents Glenn and Candy Curtis and their teenage son, Sean, lead a workshop on monarch butterflies at the Moorestown Friends Meetinghouse. The workshop was presented by the Friends Enrichment Program (FEP). Under Sean’s guidance, children handled caterpillars and watched them crawl up their arms to their heart’s delight.

The Curtises have been growing milkweed plants in their yard for six or seven years, thus providing a welcoming habitat for the monarch, a butterfly that deposits its eggs almost exclusively on milkweeds. It was Sean that sparked the family’s involvement in the lives of the monarch butterflies.

As a small boy, he developed a keen interest in insects, an interest that peaked after he attended a monarch butterfly workshop in Vincentown. His fascination was so contagious that even his grandfather, Ken Curtis, became interested to the point where a few weeks ago he hosted a chrysalis in his home.

“Sean is the one who got us started,” the adults said. “We couldn’t stay behind. We had to keep up.”

The workshop reached its climax with the release of the butterflies skyward over Moorestown Friends School’s athletic field. Participants watched them flap their wings and take off. Some were hesitant and clinging to humans, while others quickly grew in self-confidence and headed for a nearby tree or for the world beyond.

Soon these young, immature butterflies will join other monarch groups and begin migrating toward overwintering monarch butterfly grounds. Covering nearly 100 miles a day, they may travel as far as the ancient oyamel fir forests of Mexico, thousands of miles from Moorestown.

With luck, some of these butterflies might survive the perilous journey and live eight to nine months, long enough to join next year’s spring migration. Their descendants may return to the same areas where their ancestors were born earlier this year.

Workshop participants were handed small bags of milkweed pods. They now have what it takes to help protect a beloved butterfly that beautifies our gardens and fields and plays a major role as a pollinator.
For more information about the FEP and its Sunday afternoon activities, call Monique Begg at 856-235-3963.

The attached images were provided by the FEP