Santa Cruz County is full of wonder and beauty that attract visitors from all over the world. Now that summer tourists have gone and autumn has arrived, it’s the perfect time to be a tourist in your own hometown, because some of that wonder and beauty arrives this month on the orange and black stained glass wings of monarch butterflies. Western monarchs migrate to the California coast from their summer breeding grounds in a ring of states that includes Washington, western Montana, Utah, and northern Arizona. They spend the winter in sheltered forests close to the ocean, and the eucalyptus groves in our own Natural Bridges State Beach is one of a handful of prime viewing areas in the state.
A couple of centuries ago, you would have seen the monarchs in redwood groves and, farther down the coast in Pacific Grove, in Monterey pines and cypresses. But they found they preferred the eucalyptus trees that were brought here by Australians during the Gold Rush, and that’s still where you can find them today. Monarch clusters are remarkably camouflaged in the trees, but stand still, looking up, and wait. What appears to be dangling leaves will suddenly come alive, flitting about and filling the sky with color, before returning to the safety of their clusters.
It’s a remarkable sight – one that you should see while you still can. The monarch population dropped dramatically over the past decade; the 2007 migration population of 1,300 is just a fraction of the 120,000 visitors in 1997. The decrease has been blamed on lack of available milkweed. Milkweed is a plant essential to monarch survival; they lay their eggs on the leaves that hatch into caterpillars. The caterpillars feed only on milkweed, they form chrysalises on the plants, and after transforming into butterflies, the monarchs feed on the plants’ nectar, building up a poison that warns off predators. In August of this year, the nonprofit groups Center for Biological Diversity, Center for Food Safety, and Xerces Society (www.xerces.org/monarchs/) filed a petition with the Fish and Wildlife service to have monarchs put on the endangered species list, blaming the weed killer Round-Up for a wide-scale decimation of milkweed. And without milkweed, there are no monarchs.
Natural Bridges is open for self-guided tours between sunrise and sunset daily. Just follow the 300-foot, wheelchair-accessible boardwalk from the parking lot at the visitor’s center into the heart of the eucalyptus grove. Look for the annual “Welcome Back Monarchs!” Day on October 12 from 10 am – 4 pm.
