Development of a Novel "Systematic, Integrated Component Approach" To Produce Artificial Diets for Monarch Butterflies, Queen Butterflies

Millions of brush footed butterflies, are sold yearly for education, research, environmental concerns, and for ceremony. However, monarchs and are among the most popular products. Also, because of environmental concerns, monarchs are important to ecologists, educators, and biotechnologists. However, monarch availability is limited and costly because rearing requires fresh milkweeds. We will develop an integrated approach to diet development and a diet that simulates milkweed hosts for monarch larvae. It will contain extracts that offer the chemical signature of optimal hosts and will contain balanced nutrients that parallel natural host plants. The diet will provide nutrients in forms that meet bioavailability needs to parallel nutrient formats in natural hosts. It will be desiccated to make it stable and resistant to deterioration. It will support growth of healthy adults with normal biological functions, including protective chemical profiles. The final product will be inexpensive enough to promote increased sales of monarchs for the specified purposes. Importantly, the integrated approach to be developed in this project will be applicable to diet development for other butterflies and insects that cannot now be reared on diets, especially weed biocontrol agents. A. This project establishes the detailed feeding processes of monarch and queen butterflies. B.The purpose of this study is to develop a practical and economical artificial diet for monarch butterflies.