1. Monarch Larva Monitoring Project
Goals and Roles

2. “A Cooperative Effort to Generate and Share Ecological Knowledge”
Citizen Science:
Involves the public in organized scientific research
Is often used in conservation, applied ecology, & natural resource management
Is an important tool in basic ecological research
Denny Brooks
What is citizen science? All of the above! Results can be especially important when making conservation decisions. Other public monitoring projects are also important for studying local issues like water and air quality. Sometimes, results from these smaller community based monitoring projects go on to inform local policy as well.
Wendy Caldwell

3. Examples of Citizen Science Projects
National Audubon Society’s Christmas Bird Count
Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s FeederWatch, eBird
The Banished Beetle Project
Migratory Dragonfly Partnership
Tons of Opportunities!
There are a variety of citizen science projects that volunteers contribute to. The Audubon Society’s Chirstmas Bird count is one of the longest running citizen science projects in existence. The Migratory Dragonfly partnership monitors dragonflies across the country. The opportunities for involvement are endless.  

4. Monarch Citizen Science
Monarch citizen science formally began in 1952 with Dr. Fred Urquhart’s Insect Migration Association.
Citizen science volunteers engage in many actions that have important conservation outcomes, from teaching others to improving and creating habitat.
Since 2000, two-thirds of papers on field based research outside of the Mexican Reserve (where only scientists with permits are allowed) used citizen science data. (Ries and Oberhauser, 2015).
MONITORING PROGRAMS
North American Butterfly Association count program
Illinois monitoring network
Ohio monitoring network
No. CA monitoring program
MN monitoring site
Monarch Larva Monitoring Project
Monarch Health
Journey North
World Wildlife Fund in Mexico
Thanksgiving Monarch Counts
MonarchWatch
Southwest Monarchs
Cape May roost monitoring
Long Point roost monitoring
Peninsula Point roost monitoring
Citizen science has been around for a long time, but it is growing rapidly in popularity, especially for large scale environmental monitoring projects. Monarch citizen science began with Dr. Fred Urquhart and the Insect Migration Association in 1937, when Dr. Urquhart began tagging monarch butterflies in hopes of discovering their overwintering grounds. 2 citizen scientists, Kenneth Brugger and Catalina Trail, discovered the overwintering sites in 1975, a finding that was called the “entomological discovery of the 20th Century”

5. Monarch Citizen Science
Journey North
Monarch Watch
Project Monarch Health
Xerces Society Overwintering Count
Journey North: Volunteers report sightings of monarchs, milkweed, roosts, and eggs to JN. These entries are displayed on a real time map that is quite useful for tracking the monarch population throughout the breeding season and is an accurate representation of monarch migration in the Fall and Spring.
Monarch Watch: MW tags monarchs east of the rocky mountains in an attempt to learn more about their migratory patterns. A small tag is adhered to the monarchs hindwing before the migratory monarch is released. Tags that are recovered are reported back to journey north and the distance and flight path of the monarch are uncovered.
Project Monarch Health: MH studies the debilitating OE parasite. The goal of the project is to gain a broader understanding of host-parasite interaction in monarch butterflies, and track the OE parasitim rates of monarchs in the wild.
Xerces Society Overwintering Count: Each year, citizen scientists with the Western Monarch Thanksgiving Count visit California overwintering sites to estimate monarch populations. The count the monarchs roosting the trees along the CA coastline to come up with a number for the overwintering western population. A decline in this population has been observed as well.

6. Why Monitor Monarchs? Scientific Reasons:
The monarch’s large spatial and temporal range makes volunteer contributions necessary to answer population-level questions.
Variety of research approaches.
Monarchs are an ecosystem indicator.
Practical Reasons:
Monarchs are a flagship species.
Monarchs are declining & monitoring is an important conservation tool.
Engages youth and adults in science and conservation.
Variety of research approaches: the vast amount of data collected from monitoring allows researchers to ask specific questions and use volunteer-gathered data to answer them, like questions about immature survival rates and egg densities. Ecological niche modeling can also be used to predict the monarch’s range in future scenarios by using the current recorded presence of monarchs reported by volunteers.
Ecosystem Indicator: the health of the monarch population serves as a symbolic representation of the health of our land. The monarch’s decline is indication that we are facing serious environmental issues that need to be addressed. This is something that inspires volunteers.
Flagship species: meaning that monarchs serve as an ambassador for a specific ecosystem or environmental cause, in this case habitat loss due to development and changes in agricultural practices.
UMN Monarch Lab

7. MONARCH LARVA MONITORING PROJECT
Mission: Understand how and why monarch populations vary in time and space, with a focus on monarch distribution and abundance during the breeding season in North America.
As an MLMP volunteer, your contributions will aid in conserving monarchs and their threatened migratory phenomenon, and advance our understanding of butterfly ecology in general.
The goal of the MLMP is to collect data that documents spatial and temporal differences in monarch abundance. Essentially where and how many monarchs there are at different times during the breeding season.
this requires a volunteer base across a large range. Over 1200 registered sites in 2015, but not all are monitored. 350 were actively monitored in 2015 (50% increase from 2014). Data collected by volunteers monitoring these sites have informed publications on many topics in monarch biology like monarch parasitism rates, breeding dynamics, and migration dynamics.
Only 7 states don not have monitoring sites, but blue dots are anecdotal reports so even if no sites they are still participating or have the opportunity to participate.

8. Outreach/Dissemination Goal #1
Increased Scientific Literacy
Understand local ecosystems and basic ecological principles.
Understand policy and conservation applications of ecological data.
Connect scientists and the general public.
Understand what conservation actions
you can take to preserve monarch habitat.
Accomplished by:
In-depth training (in person and online)
Communication with volunteers.
Participation in citizen science increases engagement in conservation actions (Lewandowski & Oberhauser, 2015)
Training takes volunteers on a journey through the milkweed ecosystem highlighting different interactions and basic principles of insect ecology. Volunteers meet and engage with professional scientists, whom they can contact and talk to when they are participating in the project. Communication between volunteers is also encouraged.
Through time spent in training and actually outside monitoring, volunteers understand what it takes to conserve monarchs and what a healthy successful monarch/pollinator habitat looks like.

9. Outreach/Dissemination Goal #2
Dissemination to Participants and Community
Exhibits, informational resources, and materials for participating volunteers and organizations.
Regional trainers and online training videos.
Bi-monthly newsletters to volunteers conveying project findings, background information, monitoring tips, monarch population updates, and volunteer spotlights.
MLMP Website
MLMP Facebook and Twitter
Inclusion of MLMP in Federal Citizen Science Toolkit to inform government programs
Charlie Gatchell
Exhibits info can be used by trainers at regional trainings sessions, can be used by people promoting citizen science/monarch butterfly outreach. Many nature centers and museums keep MLMP information on hand for interested guests.
Anyone (volunteer or not) can receive the MLMP newsletter and participate on social media!
MLMP was featured in the Federal Citizen Science Toolkit as an example of a successful citizen science program that can be used by government agencies to collect data for conservation and to get other people involved as a form of conservation based outreach and education.
MLMP.org

10. Outreach/Dissemination Goal #3
Connect Educators with Citizen Science Research
Formal Education
K-12 Involvement
Use citizen science to spark inquiry in students, leading to independent investigations.
Informal Education
Nature Centers, Scouts, Summer Science Club, Master Gardeners
Advance community knowledge of conservation.
Connecting formal, informal, and non-MLMP volunteers to the project. Citizen science in the classroom can be used to inspire students to undertake investigations. Existing citizen science data can be used to explain the science process and begin independent investigations. Ultimately, incorporating citizen science into formal and informal education will increase the public’s scientific literacy and the communities knowledge of conservation.
Formal and Informal Education: Bringing citizen science into the classroom and other programming. A great example of incorporating citsci into informal education is the UMN Driven to Discover project:
Videos accessible through this website would be great to augment a training if you use this presentation.
Non MLMP Vols: Anecdotal reporting makes it so ANYONE can participate, even if it is just a one time record. Data is completely available to the public, so non-MLMP volunteers can access basic data that can be used to analyze trends in a specific area (like a park or roadside) so proper management decisions can be made that include what is best for monarch butterflies and other pollinators at a specific location.
Kip Kiphart
Non-MLMP Volunteers
MonarchNet: Monarch Citizen Science hub
MLMP data & project findings are accessible to anyone.
Anecdotal Reporting
Data/curriculum utilization

11. Project Activities Goal #1
Provide baseline data on monarch population biology for scientists, policy makers, educators, and the public.
Basic distribution and abundance data
Temporal and spatial comparisons
Importance of various monarch habitats
Effects of environmental perturbations, like climate change and pesticides
Population dynamics: Mortality, parasitoids, egg density, predation, winter breeding, etc.
Data collected for the MLMP activities are analyzed by Monarch Lab (et al) researchers and used for scientific publications in high impact journals. Results from the project and results published in scientific journals can be used to inform conservation decisions regarding monarch butterflies. The 2014 pollinator memorandum identified citizen science as playing a major role in pollinator conservation.

12. Project Activities Goal #2
Provide Trainer and Volunteer Support
Encourage and facilitate communication between volunteers
Retain volunteers and recruit new participants
Disseminate findings on website, social media
Make data collection and entry easy and meaningful
In-person local & national training sessions
Data sheets and directions, & on-line Training Videos
Assuring quality data by training quality volunteers
Add MLMP to Monarch SOS monarch citizen science app for iPhone
Supporting trainers and volunteers is a high priority for the MLMP. We always encourage our volunteers and trainers to provide feedback about what works and what doesn’t work during training sessions, monitoring, classroom implementation, etc. Feedback from training sessions are used to improve the training and the program as a whole. We want to hear from our volunteers!
Online training videos and clear but thorough activity directions make data collection and entry easy, and the variety of activities make it simple for people to participate in one or many aspects of the entire MLMP project. Volunteers can pick and choose how and when to participate.
New Monarch-based citizen science app for iPhone called Monarch SOS will feature the MLMP (among other monarch citizen science projects) on the app with a feature that makes data collection and entry possible directly from the application! Final version coming in 2016.

13. Project Activities Goal #3
Use MLMP data to inform conservation strategies.
Use MLMP data to establish evidence based conservation strategies for monarch butterflies and other pollinators.
Explore how a changing climate will affect the monarch’s annual migration.
Increase number of monitoring sites in areas where we lack data, specifically the West and Southwest.
MLMP is the most published monarch citizen science project! The data collected by volunteers are ACTUALLY USED by MLMP researchers and often make up the basis of an entire publication. MLMP data has helped address countless monarch conservation issues like immature monarch survival, parasitism rates of tachinid flies, potential effect of climate change on monarch’s range, monarch’s use of milkweed in Ag fields, and the actual social science behind participating in a citizen science project.
Data is lacking in the West and Southwest where some crucial aspects about monarch population dynamics remain a mystery. In the coming years we would like to increase or volunteer base in the West and Southwest to learn more about monarchs West of the Rocky Mountains.

14. University of Minnesota Monarch Lab
Training, Resources, Protocol
Provide training materials and instruction
Provide hands-on practice with monitoring and larva ID
Directions and resources for training, recruiting, & working with the media
Develop and refine MLMP protocols
Project Communication and Support
Newsletter, website, national trainings, Facebook, Twitter
Resources for institutions to recruit new monitors
/Social Media support and field questions from volunteers
Data analysis and dissemination
Peer-reviewed publications
Evaluation
To improve and sustain the program
The University of Minnesota Monarch Lab is the organization that “houses” the MLMP program. Dr. Karen Oberhauser, MLMP founder, is also the director of the Monarch Lab. Monarch Lab/MLMP staff are the main contacts for MLMP volunteers. Monarch Lab is involved in distributing resources during trainings/to trainers/to volunteers as well as supporting MLMP volunteers with communications regarding not only MLMP project updates, but monarch population updates, useful education resources, and milkweed/prairie ecosystem information.
The Monarch Lab also updates an online repository of monarch-centric and citizen science publications that are available to the public. These are great resources for anyone who is interested in knowing more about monarch research or for reading the publications that use MLMP data.

15. MLMP Volunteer Trainers
Conduct monitoring workshops
Registration, recruitment, logistics, materials
Provide training for a variety of volunteer types
Help volunteers develop implementation plans and find sites
Facilitate on-site monitoring
Set up schedule, maintain data, train others
Oversee data input
Follow-up and support: maintain excitement and involvement
Retain volunteers
Education
Display
Incorporation into other program activities
Volunteer trainers are an incredibly important asset to the MLMP. Since the MLMP is based in MN, it is difficult for us to visit all the regions across the USA that could be involved with monarch monitoring, even though MLMP staff does conduct training sessions in a few states other than MN, we can’t get everywhere. Luckily, many dedicated volunteers have decided to be regional trainers.
Volunteer trainers are often involved with a larger organization, like a museum or nature center, where they coordinate the monitoring efforts of that respective organization. Regional trainers are a resource for volunteers they communicate with, and are often involved in helping volunteers establish MLMP monitoring sites, find resources to distribute to others, and oversee data input for sites they coordinate.

16. MLMP Citizen Scientists
Conduct weekly monitoring
Per plant monarch density
Site description, milkweed density
Optional weather, plant condition and parasitism data
Data input
Online data forms
Data validation
Education
For children, students, community, etc.
This project is impossible without dedicated MLMP citizen scientists!