Fifteen monarch butterflies fitted with tiny solar-powered radio tags at the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge are already proving just how far these fragile-looking insects can travel. All 15 have reached at least southern Texas on their journey south, and one especially speedy traveler has already crossed into Monterrey, Mexico, covering more than 1,000 kilometers — roughly 621 miles — in just 14 days.
The refuge recently took part in a research project using the solar-powered tags to follow monarchs as they migrate toward their wintering grounds in Mexico, according to News 9. Refuge staff captured 30 monarchs with support from the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Ecological Services, Monarch Watch and the Oklahoma City Zoo and Botanical Garden. From that group, researchers selected 15 butterflies to receive solar-powered BluMorpho radio tags.
Tagging the Thorax Without Slowing Them Down
Dr. Emily Geest, a conservation scientist at the Oklahoma City Zoo and Botanical Garden, worked alongside her field crew, refuge staff and volunteers to attach the tags to the butterflies' thoraxes, per the station's report. The refuge says the devices weigh significantly less than the butterflies themselves and do not negatively affect their ability to fly — a key detail given how much ground these insects still had to cover after being released.
Monarchs found in Oklahoma belong to the eastern migratory population, which breeds across the central and eastern United States and southern Canada before wintering in Mexico, according to the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation. Some butterflies in that population migrate more than 2,000 miles in total, the department notes. Oklahoma sits directly along the central funnel of that eastern migration corridor, as reported by the Oklahoma Farm Report, putting the Wichita Mountains refuge squarely in the path of millions of migrating monarchs each fall.
How the Project Fits a Bigger Tracking Push
The project is designed to improve scientists' understanding of monarch migration patterns and the routes butterflies take during their annual journey, the outlet's report states. It's part of a broader wave of solar-tag tracking: researchers deployed more than 400 BlūMorpho transmitters across southern Canada and the northern United States during fall 2025, and 28 of those tagged monarchs had reached Mexican overwintering latitudes by March 2026, according to Electronic Design.
Other tagged monarchs from the same migration season show just how uneven the journey can be. In a separate analysis from Monarch Watch, one monarch designated MW021 went 20.81 days between detections — the longest gap recorded — before being spotted northwest of Oklahoma City, while another, MW005, vanished from trackers for 67.10 days between a Gulf Coast detection and a later sighting at Cerro Pelón in central Mexico. Among 25 monarchs analyzed in a separate fall 2025 tagging effort, only 10 ultimately reached Mexico, with an average maximum detection gap of 8.34 days across all tracked butterflies.
A different Oklahoma monarch tagged near Stillwater on October 8, 2025, offers a glimpse of what a completed round trip can look like. Known as XSTI009, it reached the overwintering sites in central Mexico and then began its spring return, with detections tracing it to East Texas by March 18, 2026, according to Cellular Tracking Technologies. The company described it as the first individually tracked monarch confirmed to complete a full documented southward migration to Mexico and then begin the journey north, having logged 918 detections by that date.
A Population Still Recovering
The stakes behind all this tracking data are real: monarch butterfly populations have declined by 90 percent over the past 30 years, according to The Journal Record. There are signs of a rebound, though — the eastern monarch population at Mexican overwintering sanctuaries climbed 64 percent over recent low points, per the Oklahoma Farm Report, even as numbers remain below historic long-term averages. The Journal Record also reports that the Oklahoma City Zoo and Dallas Zoo tagged 40 monarchs with solar-powered Bluetooth transmitters this year to follow the spring migration from central Mexico back up to Canada.
For now, Oklahomans curious about the Wichita Mountains monarchs can follow along themselves. The flight paths of all 15 tagged butterflies are viewable on the Project Monarch tracking map, where the public can search for WMWR to find them. Monarch Watch offers more information for anyone wanting to dig deeper into the research and the radio-tagging technology behind it.
