Currents
A
s I considered my message for
the current issue, I thought
about the importance of every
creature within our ecosystem
here on Kiawah. While we often speak about
the significance of animals at the top of the
chain, such as the bobcat or the alligator, those
at the other end of the spectrum merit equal
attention.
This past winter six people from Kiawah
including four of the naturalists from Heron
Park Nature Center participated in tagging
monarch butterflies on the Island. This
program, involving capturing the impressive
butterflies in a net, gathering and recording
data about each one, and applying a tiny,
feather-light tag to each, is part of a wideranging study of this species.
Over the past few years there has been a
serious decline in the numbers of monarchs
world-wide, and everything we learn about
60
Monarch butterfly photo by Tina Schell
them will help us discover how to reverse this
alarming trend.
From the efforts of the researchers we
can learn about the migratory patterns of
monarchs and ultimately about how we can
manage our own habitat to help preserve the
wildlife with whom we share it. It is up to all
of us working together to help ensure that the
small chrysalis we find on our milkweed plants
has a chance to become one of the beautiful
monarchs who color our world. NK
“The privilege of possessing the earth entails
the responsibility of passing it on, the better for
our use, not only to immediate posterity, but to
the Unknown Future, the nature of which is not
given us to know.”—Aldo Leopold
Donna Windham
Executive Director