Grant to Provide Monarch Butterfly Habitat Along Nebraska Cowboy Trail

By Vanessa Torres

Nebraska -(Ammoland.com)- The Nebraska Game and Parks Commission has received a $150,000 grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation to provide habitat for Monarch butterflies.

The grant will allow the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission to plant milkweed along stretches of the National Cowboy Recreation and Nature Trail. Milkweed is essential to the Monarchs; they lay their eggs on milkweed plants, and larvae feed on milkweed. In recent years, the amount of milkweed along Monarchs’ migration path has declined. The decline of milkweed, combined with a decline in the butterflies’ winter habitat in Mexico, has resulted in a drop in Monarch numbers over the past few years.

In September, the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, in cooperation with partner organizations, planted 3,000 milkweed seedlings along stretches of the Cowboy Trail near Bassett and Norfolk. Over the course of the next two years, Game and Parks and partner organizations will plant approximately 140 acres along the Cowboy Trail and at several state parks and recreation areas with a combination of milkweed and native prairie plants beneficial to bees and other pollinator species.

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Source:: AmmoLand