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Photo of the Monarch butterfly
North AmericaVulnerable

Monarch butterfly

Danaus plexippus

An orange-and-black butterfly famous for its long autumn migration.

Weight
About 0.5 g
Size
10 cm wingspan
Lifespan
Weeks; migrants up to 8 months
Top speed
About 20 km/h flying
Diet
Nectar (caterpillars: milkweed)

How heavy is that?

So light that a 40 kg kid weighs as much as 80,000 of them

Where it lives

Three things to know

  1. Some fly up to about 4,000 km to forests in the mountains of Mexico.
  2. No single butterfly makes the round trip: it takes several generations.
  3. Caterpillars eat milkweed, which makes them taste bad to birds.
Try the body explorerSee its neighbours

Compare with…

Weight
Monarch butterfly0.5 g
A 10-year-old kid40 kg
The kid weighs about 80,000× as much as the monarch butterfly
Size
Monarch butterfly10 cm
A 10-year-old kid1.4 m
The kid is about 14× as big as the monarch butterfly
Top speed
Monarch butterfly20 km/h
A 10-year-old kid20 km/h
About the same
Lifespan
Monarch butterfly8.4 mths
A 10-year-old kid80 yrs
The kid can live about 114× as long as the monarch butterfly

Food chain

  1. MilkweedProducer
  2. Monarch butterflyThis animal

 

Life cycle

  1. EggA tiny egg laid on a milkweed leaf. It hatches after about 4 days.
  2. CaterpillarIt eats milkweed for about 2 weeks and grows about 2,000 times heavier, moulting 5 times.
  3. ChrysalisInside a green case with gold dots, its body is rebuilt in about 10 days.
  4. ButterflyIt drinks nectar and lays eggs. Summer butterflies live 2–6 weeks; migrants up to 8 months.

↺ Then it starts all over again.