This morning we're going to head off down into the wetland, into a very specific kind of wetland called the Prairie fen.

You can find Nate Fuller counting butterflies. The Sarett Nature Center needs an accurate count of Mitchell's satyr butterflies to help preserve one of their last known habitats. They're very particular about the kind of habitat where they can live, which is part of what makes them so rare and amazing indicators for our water quality. Today, Sarett expert Ashley Cole-Wick with Michigan's Natural Features Inventory helps Fuller count. She says "When I first started working on the butterfly in 2013, we had 18 populations and this year in 2019, we have 10."

The Mitchell Seder went on the endangered species list in 1991. Initially it was thought that loss of wetlands contributed to their decline. Fuller says "It's not just habitat availability. Its groundwater and the amount in the quality of groundwater coming into these wetlands seem to be a challenge for the butterfly. Nothing has all been sorted out exactly. ” While the decline is likely a combination of factors. the fact that water quality might contribute is alarming because the wetlands are the headwaters for the Midwest's rivers and streams.

A captive breeding （人工繁殖）program was started four years ago at the Toledo Zoo to help get to the bottom of the mystery. Today Director Ryan Walsh who heads the program says it's been, the only successful captive program. The caterpillars （毛毛虫）spend the winter in a special weather control room that help determine the Mitchell satyrs don't do well below 4. 4 degrees Celsius, a temperature that prevents the Fen wetlands from the hard freezes which kill the insects. With that knowledge, the program produced 1300 new eggs this summer, a development that may go a long way toward restoring the population. And if all goes well, may one day the Mitchell satyr butterfly earn a ticket off Endangered Species List.

As a boy, Ramirez Cruz loved hiking with his grandfather up into the mountains of central Mexico. While the old man hunted for wild mushrooms, Ramirez would play among the monarch butterflies that migrated 3,000 miles to this forest each autumn, turning the blue sky into a sea of orange.

Ramirez is 75 now and each winter he still goes looking for butterflies. But these days, he might spend hours searching the forest without catching sight of a single one.

The world is losing monarch butterflies at a surprising rate, as many human activities destroy their natural habitats. But the biggest threat yet has only recently come into focus. Climate change, with its extreme storms, is destroying the forest that serves as the butterfly’s winter home.

To help his beloved butterflies, Ramirez has partnered with scientists on an experiment: They are trying to move an entire forest 1,000 feet up a mountain. He agrees with scientists that it is necessary to create an ecosystem where the butterflies will be able to survive.

Over the last several years, the team of researchers has overseen the relocation(迁移) of about 1,000 trees that were growing at lower altitudes up to higher and cooler areas. Ramirez and the scientists hope to expand the project and establish the trees at even higher altitudes on other nearby mountains if temperatures continue to soar.

After checking on the trees, Ramirez went off to look for the butterflies. He found a few butterflies then a few more. There weren’t as many as he remembered from his childhood, but it was still a sight to see. Ramirez eased himself down to sit on the soft forest floor and watched in silence. The only sound was the whistle of the wind and the gentle flapping(拍打) of their wings.