Did you know…
that every 4th generation of monarch butterflies, specifically the generation the flies from the southern United States to their winter migration spot in Mexico live 10x longer than the three generations that came before them?
In the first episode of a documentary series I watched today by National Geographic called Great Migrations, Nat. Geo. explored the Monarch butterflies migration patterns. The migration cycle is a year long cycler that spans 4 generations of butterflies. Every 6-8 weeks, monarchs lay their eggs hundreds of miles southward of where they were born and begin a new generation. On the last leg of their journey, monarchs give rise to one more generation coined a ‘super-generation’ that lives 10x longer (~6-7 months long) who then makes the long journey into the center of Mexico. They live mostly sedentary lives here until the cycle begins again.