Science Pub: Western Monarch Overwintering

Each year, in late autumn and winter, thousands of Monarch butterflies migrate to Santa Barbara for temperate weather. Western Monarch Count Regional Coordinator Charis van der Heide will feed your need for information on all things Monarch! Learn how the Western Monarch Count tracks Monarch butterflies migrating through our area, and what we can do to help this species locally. Van der Heide will talk about Monarch butterfly biology, their population and fluctuations, their overwintering habitat and structure, and Monarchs in Mexico.

Charis van der Heide is a wildlife biologist who has been counting, studying, and monitoring the movements of Monarch butterflies on the Central Coast of California for over 20 years. She has a B.S. in biological sciences from Cal Poly State University San Luis Obispo where she started researching and tagging Monarch butterflies. She works for Althouse and Meade, Inc. as a senior biologist, where she designs habitat management plans for Monarch butterfly overwintering sites on the Central Coast and on several other Monarch-related research projects.

Join the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History‘s fun and friendly conversation and quench your thirst for knowledge about science and nature in this ongoing series of free science talks held on the second Monday of every month. No tickets or reservations required, but be sure to get to Dargan’s (18 E. Ortega St. in downtown Santa Barbara) at least an hour early to secure a seat and order your favorite food and drink.

For more information, contact Director of Education Rosina Garcia at rgarcia@sbnature2.org.

Photo courtesy Charis van der Heide