Workshops for Land Managers of Breeding and Overwintering Habitat and Citizen Science Monitors
Country
United States
Region
West
Agency Type
NGO
Target or Affiliated Species or Habitat
Monarques
Original Language
English
“The Xerces Society conducts a wide array of educational workshops for various audiences important to protecting the monarch migration. Training land managers, federal [and state] agency staff and citizen science monitors in key regions is essential to long term habitat restoration and conservation” (MJV 2015). The Xerces Society conducts monarch conservation short courses that focus on breeding and overwintering site management.
These courses educate land managers and citizen scientists about monarch identification, biology, status, habitat requirements, citizen science efforts and best management practices for enhancing and restoring breeding and overwintering sites in the western US. “The Xerces Society has also teamed up with other western monarch experts to organize and host workshops to train citizen scientists to monitor monarch overwintering sites. The workshops include training on how to count monarch clusters and estimate the monarch population size at a specific site, how to utilize the habitat assessment protocol, as well as information on monarch biology and migration.
They invigorate current citizen scientists, and engage new ones in monarch monitoring in important overwintering habitat areas. Current Xerces efforts have been planned to educate federal agency staff working in natural areas in key breeding areas of the Western US. While there is a need to establish new monarch habitats, it is important to also ensure that existing monarch habitat is protected. In the breeding range of the smaller western monarch population, there is a significant amount of milkweed on federally managed lands.
Targeting education efforts towards federal staff to effectively protect, restore, and monitor these habitats is a priority of the Xerces and MJV. Through partnerships with federal agencies and ongoing education efforts, we can work together to ensure that the management strategies employed on publicly owned lands are compatible with the survival and recovery of monarch populations” (MJV 2015).
- Monarch Joint Venture (MJV). 2015. Workshops for Overwintering Site Land Managers and Citizen Science Monitors. http://monarchjointventure.org/our-work/workshops-for-overwinting-site-land-managers.