Endangered butterfly, repopulated with help from inmates of local Washington prison

There are only 4 locations where over 50 Taylor’s checkerspot butterfly can be spotted. One site is located on private land in Oregon. Another location is the oak-woodland prairie in the southern Puget Sound where a "Cross-Base Highway" is poised to tear up the prairie. There is also a prairie that makes up the artillery range at Joint Base Lewis-McChord. If the Taylor's checkerspot butterfly (pictured right) were placed on the federal endangered species list it would interrupt training at the artillery range. - Right off the artillery range is located the greenhouse where prison inmates are trying to repopulate the delicate butterflies, their success may also set regulations at the range. Should the butterfly be placed on the federal endangered species list, the U.S. Department of Fish and Wildlife could direct the use of the butterflies’ remaining habitat to ensure their survival, according to Jim Lynch, a biologist with the base’s fish and wildlife program.

Before its current dramatic decline, the Taylor’s checkerspot butterfly was documented at more than seventy sites in British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon where it is now a rare insect of woodland prairies of the Northwest.

Taylor’s checkerspot populations are declining quickly in the Northwest, where it traditionally lived in coastal and inland grasslands on southern Vancouver Island and surrounding islands in British Columbia and the San Juan Island archipelago, as well as in open prairies on post-glacial gravelly outwash and balds in Washington’s Puget Trough and Oregon’s Willamette Valley. 

Because the Taylor’s checkerspot is so sensitive to changes in its habitat, its presence is an indicator of the health of the entire ecosystem. If no protection is garnered it is likely that the Taylor’s checkerspot butterfly will disappear and that an entire ecosystem might follow a similar destiny.

The Taylor's checkerspot is threatened most by the degradation and destruction of its habitat. Agricultural and urban development, encroachment of trees, and spread of invasive plants all continue to threaten the native grasslands in which it is found. In addition, pesticide use and recreational activities pose a direct threat to the butterflies themselves. 

According to the Natural Resources Conservation Service, there were once an estimated quarter-million acres of prairie in western Washington. That number is in several thousand acres today. Native grasslands are vulnerable to agricultural and urban development, tree encroachment, and invasive plant expansion.

The Sustainable Prisons Project was born in 2004 as a way to connect scientists with offenders, who could help with research and conservation and learn a skill. The project made headlines in 2009. when inmates at Cedar Creek Corrections Center south of Olympia began successfully raising the endangered Oregon spotted frog. The project has also helped to raise more than 500,000 delicate prairie plants. 

The inmates at Mission Creek Corrections Center began their part to the The Sustainable Prisons Project by raising Painted Lady butterflies in September as practice before embarking on the work of raising the rarer Taylor’s checkerspot in February.

A new greenhouse at the prison off Sandhill Road (near the Joint Base Lewis McChord previously mentioned) has been built with the intent to replenish the endangered Taylor’s checkerspot butterfly. If the inmates are successful, butterflies raised in will be moved to inhabit prairies in the south Puget Sound area, boosting their dwindling population.

The work is delicate and intricate. Inmates will use tools to move larvae onto leaves, among other tasks. They’ll carefully monitor their growth and development. When they reach maturity, they’ll be released.

Programs in the prisons have been thus far successful because of the notes and observations taken by the inmates and the amount of time they can devote to them. It gives them a sense of accomplishment in what can be a bleak environment.

Catherine Caruso, a spokeswoman at Joint Base Lewis McChord, said the base is hopeful the endeavor is successful in helping replenish the Taylor’s checkerspot, and avert a possible extinction of the species.

“You see them light up when they talk about their work”, she said, “They know they’re making a contribution.”

The prison’s greenhouse, erected by inmates at the prison, was built with a $30,000 grant from the Department of Defense, she said.

originial link: http://www.king5.com/news/environment/Washington-prison-inmates-raise-imperiled-butterflies-131328999.html