Science of summer: Threatened monarchs battle back for best summer in years

As September arrives, our series on the Science of Summer is still in full swing. Today Tom Spears finds good news that no one expected for a brilliant butterfly that was once found all over this region in late summer.
Monarch butterflies, the flashy insects that have been close to extinction for years, are suddenly flapping their orange-and-black wings all over our region in a population boom that has stunned biologists.
“In the last several years you look around and you (didn’t) se