TJ third-graders release butterflies in ISU Monarch on the Move project

Isaac Fuentes looks up toward the gray autumn sky and sees his orange and black-spotted butterfly float away.

“It’s going that way,” the Thomas Jefferson Elementary third-grader said.

His classmate Makenzly Brant, her head tilted back, said: “I hope we get more butterflies.”

The Newton Community School District students, along with rest of Paula Lureman’s third-grade class, released several Monarch butterflies Oct. 5 near the school’s butterfly/milkweed garden — Monarchs’ natural habitat. The students began raising the monarchs from egg stage on Labor Day weekend in partnership with a program the Iowa State University Extension and Outreach.

Back inside the school, several Monarchs were still in their chrysalis stage hanging in clear plastic cups on the classroom counter, each marked with a student’s name in black Sharpie.

“All of this has been mailed to us,” Lureman said. “We went from eggs to caterpillars — this one is still in its chrysalis,” she said pointing to a cup. “We’re also collecting different types of seed to continue the milkweed.”

To get the butterflies, Lureman had to apply for ISU program which provides eggs to classrooms through an Iowa Department of Natural Resources REAP grant.

Lynne Campbell is the program coordinator and professional development specialist for the ISU Extension and Outreach STEM Learn Resources program. She said the two REAP grants totaling $49,000, and a partnership with USDA, get Monarch eggs out into Iowa classrooms as well as establish Monarch gardens like the one in development at Thomas Jefferson.

Campbell provided the third-graders a few varieties of milkweed, including Whorled and Swamp Milkweed, preferred by the Monarchs for their pollen. She said the design of the Thomas Jefferson garden was attractive to her and program planners.

“It’s really incorporated into their landscaping,” Campbell said. “They have some unique qualities about their location. It’s absolutely perfect.”

ISU's efforts have also developed a curriculum for its Monarchs on the Move project, paid for with a $20,000 grant through the National 4-H Council. It has been implemented in five states, including Iowa. Campbell said this project focuses on Monarch caterpillar survival with a portion of the grant targeting habitat restoration.

In Jasper County, the project is working through the Jasper County ISU Extension and Outreach, but both Lureman and Campbell hope to soon involve the Newton High School Ag program, possibly utilizing the student greenhouse to teach milkweed growth and implementation.

“We’re starting small,” Lureman said. “I don’t want to get too far too quick, but we are now being the tester for the milkweed. We’d love to get this (Monarch release) to become some type of community event. That’s, eventually, what I see big picture.”

Campbell said the program’s educational efforts extend to Iowa’s agricultural community, teaching farmers the importance of maintaining and growing Monarch habitat. Campbell said the project follows the vision of the Iowa Monarch Conservation Consortium — a group of stakeholders that includes groups like Iowa Farm Bureau, Iowa Corn Growers Association and the Iowa Soybean Association.

Monarchs are pollinators, and Campbell said producers represented in the Consortium need these types insects to pollinate their crops. The curriculum encourages Ag landowners to plant milkweed in and convert land that’s no longer suitable for crops such as USDA Conservation Reserve Program land or ground that has become frequently saturated due to increasing levels of from changing climate patterns.

But Campbell said, even homeowners without hundreds of acres can help with Monarch habitat in their own backyards, and that’s another area where Campbell and other experts believe students like the Thomas Jefferson third-graders can play a role.

“We think we can do that through children. They go home and say what they’re doing and, even if they don’t own agricultural land, parents can think ‘what can I do? Can I plant milkweed garden at my house?’” Campbell said. “It really is like the field of dreams, ‘if you build it they will come.’”

Contact Mike Mendenhall at 641-792-3121 Ext 6530 or at mmendenhall@newtondailynews.com