The Mystery of the Monarchs: How Kids, Teachers, and Butterfly Fans Helped Fred and Norah Urquhart Track the Great Monarch Migration by Barb Rosenstock and Erika Meza (illustrator) is a fascinating and absorbing account of how the mystery of where millions of monarch butterflies migrate over the winter was solved by Fred Urquhart, a Canadian professor of zoology and hundreds of citizens from three different countries. Fred, who lived in Toronto was a “bug man,” from the time he was eight. One of the bugs that fascinated him was the monarch butterfly. He knew a lot about the monarchs including that “during the fall, the monarchs disappeared.” Fred even wrote to a famous professor. “He asked: ‘Where do the monarchs go? He got a surprise answer: No one knew…. It was a mystery that Fred wanted to solve….” For ten years as he worked as a scientist he tried different methods of tagging the butterflies, but never heard back from anyone who found the tagged insects. Continue reading →