Relative Of Extinct Xerces Butterfly Helps Restore California Habitat Destroyed In Its Demise

Relative Of Extinct Xerces Butterfly Helps Restore California Habitat Destroyed In Its Demise

The coastal dunes of the San Francisco peninsula serve as the natural backdrop to the dramatic curve of the Golden Gate Bridge, but just recently they also became the test bed for an “amazing” experiment in rewilding.

Can an extinct species, which played a key role in its ecosystem, live on through its close relatives? That’s what ecologist at the California Academy of Sciences are trying to figure out.

Using silvery blue butterflies, the ecologists are attempting to replicate the role and activity of the extinct Xerxes blue butterfly, an important regional pollinator that became the first known invertebrate species to go extinct in North America post-industrialization.

The Gold Rush saw rapid urban development, and populations boomed in the Golden State. On the Presidio Peninsula, coastal dunes with vegetated and forested upper reaches were the home of the Xerxes blue, but the loss of this habitat meant we lost the Xerxes as well.

Professor Durrell Kapan, senior research fellow at the academy who led the field work, confirmed through lab tests that the closest living relative of the Xerxes blue was the silvery blue, and now that the Presidio dunes were restored through 30 long years of protection by the Presidio Trust and the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, it was time to give them back their butterflies.

“[The project is] an amazing opportunity to try to regenerate those missing connections using its closest relative,” Kapan told CBS. “It’s an opportunity to try to practice how we fix the environment.”

On an early morning, Kapan and colleagues arrived on the vegetated hillsides carrying cooler bags filled with small plastic ramakins containing one silvery blue each, which were contentedly feeding away on a cotton ball soaked in fruit juice.

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Released upon native flowers, volunteers tracked their movements for one hour post-release. Several immediately laid eggs, others flitted about feeding on nectar.

This is the second year in a row that silvery blues have been released in the Presidio. The original batch were released with marks on their wings for identification, but the team said they’re now seeing butterflies without marks, suggesting success.

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Dr. Phoebe Parker-Shames, a wildlife ecologist for the Presidio, said it’s as much about preparing for the future as it is about correcting mistakes made in the past.

“If one year it’s too hot for a particular species and their population sort of has a dip, there’s another species there that can help fill the same role,” she noted.

WATCH the story below from CBS…