Monarchs from the eastern population travel all the way to to the Sierra Madre mountains in central Mexico. A monarch born in Canada would have the farthest journey of all, nearly 4,000 kilometers.

Think how very tiny the butterfly is and how far it has to travel. In comparison, a 150 pound person would have to travel more than 16,300 times around the Earth to do what the monarch does!*

Such a long migration requires lots of energy. Not only do the butterflies have to fly, they have to eat. During each day of the trip, the monarchs must visit hundreds of flowers to get enough nectar for their trip.

* How'd you figure that? Let's say the average butterfly weighs 415 milligrams and the distance they will fly from Canada is about 4,000 kilometers. For every milligram of body weight, the monarch would have to fly 9.6 kilometers. 4000 / 415 = 9.6 Now, if we take our 150-pound person (68,000,000 milligams) and have them travel 9.6 kilometers for every milligram of body weight, they would travel 652,800,000 kilometers. 68,000,000 X 9.6 = 652,800,000 The circumference of the Earth is around 40,030 kilometers. When you divide total travel distance by the circumference of the Earth, you get 16,308. 652,800,000 / 40,030 = 16,308 So, how many trips could the same person take from Earth to the moon and back to equal what a monarch does? We will give you one hint: the average distance from the Earth to the moon is 384,403 kilometers.