He directs the nonprofit’s private-sector initiatives, supporting pollinator-conservation work across thousands of acres with companies like General Mills, Nestlé and Danone, undertaking habitat restoration on farms that supply them with ingredients like almonds and blueberries.
In a milkweed seed-farm field in the Midwest, he recalls witnessing a cloud of aphids descend on the breeze, as if tuned in by GPS to the emerging crops’ location.
Other invertebrates, including slugs, snails and spider mites, may feast on milkweeds, too, as do some larger animals, like rabbits and ground squirrels, which are apparently resistant to poisoning.
He expresses awe for rush milkweed (A. subulata), a three- to five-foot plant with whitish-green blooms that grows alongside the Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia) in nearly rainless parts of the desert Southwest.
At just about two and a half feet high, a mature plant can produce “strikingly abundant blooms for the space that it takes up, and attract a really remarkable spectrum of flower visitors,” he added.
Unlike Eastern butterfly populations, which overwinter in Mexico, Western monarchs spend the winter in coastal California and then move inland around March for breeding season.
The original article contains 1,549 words, the summary contains 186 words. Saved 88%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
He directs the nonprofit’s private-sector initiatives, supporting pollinator-conservation work across thousands of acres with companies like General Mills, Nestlé and Danone, undertaking habitat restoration on farms that supply them with ingredients like almonds and blueberries.
In a milkweed seed-farm field in the Midwest, he recalls witnessing a cloud of aphids descend on the breeze, as if tuned in by GPS to the emerging crops’ location.
Other invertebrates, including slugs, snails and spider mites, may feast on milkweeds, too, as do some larger animals, like rabbits and ground squirrels, which are apparently resistant to poisoning.
He expresses awe for rush milkweed (A. subulata), a three- to five-foot plant with whitish-green blooms that grows alongside the Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia) in nearly rainless parts of the desert Southwest.
At just about two and a half feet high, a mature plant can produce “strikingly abundant blooms for the space that it takes up, and attract a really remarkable spectrum of flower visitors,” he added.
Unlike Eastern butterfly populations, which overwinter in Mexico, Western monarchs spend the winter in coastal California and then move inland around March for breeding season.
The original article contains 1,549 words, the summary contains 186 words. Saved 88%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!