Record low number of 197 monarch butterflies counted at Pismo State Park

PISMO BEACH, Calif. - A record-low number of only 197 western monarch butterflies were recently counted at the Pismo State Beach butterfly grove.

"Previously, there was so many more butterflies," described Jason Baird of Bakersfield while visiting the grove Wednesday, speaking about previous trips there. "It looked like a hornet's nest. It was a big cluster of them and they all cuddled together. This year, it's dramatically different. I haven't seen any cluster of them at all. The only time I can see any is through the telescope."

This year's low number is a drastic turnaround from last year, when more than 16,000 monarchs were spotted during the park's annual post-Thanksgiving count, as well as the count two years ago in 2022, which included 25,000 monarchs.

"This is the lowest year, as far as being recorded for the population here at Pismo Beach," said Danielle Bronson,Pismo State Beach Interpretive and Cultural Program Manager. "Historically, in the late '90s they were up into the 250,000 range, so those numbers show the peril of the western monarch butterfly right now."

The signficant drop off is worrisome to park officials, tourists, as well as conservationists, who are concerned about long term future of the popular insects.

"Last I heard was somewhere between 5,000 to 7,000 statewide," said Kyle Messen, a Cal Poly biology masters student studying the butterflies in Pismo Beach.  "A typical year is more like 300,000, but this is down from our earlier accounts in the 1980s where we had in the low millions, so while this year's particularly bad, the last 20 years have also been quite bad." 

What is causing low numbers of monarchs statewide and in other parts of the nation is unknown.

"It's really hard to pinpoint one specific thing because their migratory path is a couple thousand miles," said Bronson. "It could be the lack of native milkweed. It could be not enough native pollinating flowers, not enough successful overwintering sites."

Typically this time of year, between Thanksgiving to around the beginning of the new year, is when the peak of monarch season is in full effect.

The magnificent display of thousands of monarchs clustering in the eucalyptus trees at the butterfly grove is a popular tourist draw, annually attracting thousands of visitors to Pismo Beach from both near and far.

Visitors are still showing up at the grove this year, but are having a far different experience than in year's past.

"It's a little disappointing, especially when I hyped it so much for my friends to come see it," said Baird. "However, it's still nice that there's still some."

This year's count is similar to the once conducted just four years ago in 2020, when only 199 were found.

In the three years following, there has been a big bounce back, 21,000 monarchs in 2021, 24,000 in 2022 and 16,000 last year.

Those numbers are giving hope that this year's worrisome downturn will only be a one year aberration.

We have high hopes that we can have bounce back if we have the support in order to do so," said Bronson. "We're providing education and showing the public what they can do to be impactful to them and help conservation. These guys can bounce back. If you look at their life cycle throughout the years, the population kind of goes up, down, up, down, up, down. One single female can lay up to 300 eggs, and if the conditions are right, and more eggs are successful to being immersed and go through the life cycle, then that boom could happen for us. We just need to have the right conditions and not the wrong conditions because we've had the wrong conditions lately."