Washington Island Students Tag Monarchs

Stalking monarchs on Washington Island. Photo by Tim Sweet.

Washington Island School’s fifth-, sixth- and seventh-graders went to Plum Island on Sept. 6 to learn how to tag monarch butterflies and track their migration. 

Dustan Hoffman and Frank Gercz of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service led guided hikes around the island, and Friends of Plum and Pilot Islands volunteer Amanda Danforth demonstrated how to properly catch a butterfly, tag it and carefully release it. The group tagged about a dozen monarchs, and the students acted as citizen scientists to record and add information to an online database to help follow the migration of these butterflies. Jim Robinson of Shoreline Charters in Gills Rock donated the transportation. 

Learn about monarch migration and the tagging program at monarchwatch.org/tagging.