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Fwd: FW: REUTERS: LOGGERS SAID TO WIPE OUT 22 MILLION BUTTERFLIES
- To: carolinabirds@duke.edu
- Subject: Fwd: FW: REUTERS: LOGGERS SAID TO WIPE OUT 22 MILLION BUTTERFLIES
- From: Kate Finlayson <katefin@yahoo.com>
- Date: Thu, 8 Mar 2001 06:59:52 -0800 (PST)
- Sender: carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu
-
> Say it ain't so ...!!!
>
> *****************************************
> Chris Canfield
> Executive Director
> NC State Office, National Audubon Society
> 410 Airport Rd.
> Chapel Hill, NC 27514
> 919-929-3899/fax: 919-929-4599
> email: ccanfield@audubon.org
> *****************************************
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Pat Rasmussen [mailto:patr@CRCWNET.COM]
> Sent: Wednesday, March 07, 2001 10:30 AM
> To: FOREST-LEADER@LIST.AUDUBON.ORG
> Subject: REUTERS: LOGGERS SAID TO WIPE OUT 22
> MILLION BUTTERFLIES
>
>
> Loggers Said to Wipe Out 22 Million Butterflies
> Reuters Mar 6 2001 9:56PM
>
> MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - To regain protected forest
> land, loggers may
> have deliberately wiped out some 22 million Monarch
> butterflies which
> migrate annually from Canada to Mexico for the
> winter, a top
> environmentalist said on Tuesday. Homero Aridjis,
> head of the
> environmental lobby Group of 100, told Reuters
> loggers were believed to
> have sprayed pesticide on the orange and black
> butterflies in order to
> regain some 216 square miles of forest declared
> protected by the
> government.
>
> "There has been a massive slaughter of the
> butterflies in two
> sanctuaries," Aridjis said. "This will affect the
> reproduction
> process completely. Now we don't know how many
> butterflies will come
> this autumn."
>
> Millions of monarch butterflies migrate some 3,000
> miles annually to
> flee the icy winter in Canada and the United States
> for the warmer
> fir forests in Mexico's central Michoacan state,
> some 70 miles west
> of Mexico City. For five months of the year,
> Michoacan's trees are
> turned into a flaming orange and the forest is
> carpeted with the
> delicate winged creatures. The migration has taken
> place for the past
> 10,000 years, Aridjis said. The butterflies normally
> arrive in early
> November and return north to lay eggs at the end of
> March.
>
> In November last year, the government of former
> President Ernesto
> Zedillo extended the land devoted to five
> sanctuaries. The move was in
> response to a study showing that farming and illegal
> logging had
> destroyed 44 percent of the original forest since
> 1971. Without drastic
> action, the study predicted the original forest
> would disappear in under
> 50 years.
>
> "The new decree could have prompted this," Aridjis
> said. "If there
> are no butterflies they can claim the trees without
> problem." But
> government environmental watchdog Profepa said it
> had not heard
> of the butterfly slaughter, according to inspector
> Joel Rodriguez.
> "We haven't ever registered people using pesticides.
> But it's one of
> the zones where they have the most illegal logging,"
> he said. "It
> (the butterfly deaths) could also be a result of the
> freezing this
> winter which happens every four or five years."
>
> The U.S.-based nonprofit group Packard Foundation
> donated more than
> $5 million to the Worldwide Fund for Nature to help
> the Mexican
> government rent or buy logging rights from local
> residents to
> compensate for lost income while developing
> alternative job sources.
> Aridjis said the loggers had targeted two
> sanctuaries -- Cerro San
> Andres and Las Palomas -- in the past two weeks.
>
> "The wings of the butterflies found inert on the
> ground had a strange
> luster and there was a smell of pesticide and petrol
> in the
> sanctuaries," he said.
>
> RTR/SCIENCE-ENVIRONMENT-BUTTERFLIES-DC/
> Copyright © 2001 Reuters Limited. All rights
> reserved. Republication
> or redistribution of Reuters content, including by
> framing or
> similiar means, is expressly prohibited without the
> prior written
> consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable for
> any errors or
> delays in the content, or for any actions taken in
> reliance thereon.
> All active hyperlinks have been inserted by AOL
> Anywhere.
> --
>
>
> --
> Pat Rasmussen
> Leavenworth Audubon Adopt-a-Forest
> PO Box 154
> Peshastin, WA 98847
> Phone: 509-548-7640
> patr@crcwnet.com
> www.leavenworth-leaf.com
=====
Kate Finlayson
N. Chatham Co.,N.C.
katefin@yahoo.com
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