WANTED: Farm families to help preserve monarch habitats

Farm families can sign up now for the 2018 BASF Living Acres Monarch Challenge

 

As the monarch butterflies in Mexico prepare to head north this spring, BASF is encouraging farm families to participate in the second year of its Living Acres Monarch Challenge.

 

BASF recognizes farmers are uniquely positioned to help positively impact the monarch population, which is why the program was launched last year. The decreasing monarch population is due to a variety of factors, including overwintering habitat destruction, drought in key migration paths and a reduction in milkweed habitat.

 

The reduction in milkweed habitat is critical, as milkweed is an important part of the monarch’s life cycle. It is the only plant monarchs will lay their eggs on, and the leaves of the milkweed are a main food source for the monarch larvae.

 

The Living Acres Monarch Challenge program encourages farm families to plant milkweed in non-crop areas of their land. Last year, nearly 500 farm families received kits to create their own milkweed plots. As a result, more than 9,000 milkweed plants were grown to aid the monarchs in their migration.

 

Due to the success of last year’s challenge and the continued interest in aiding these iconic insects, BASF is looking to grow the program to 1,000 farm families in 2018. Since establishing milkweed from seed can be rather difficult, this year, milkweed seedlings will be sent to those registering for the challenge instead of seeds. Seedlings are already established, making it easier to grow and maintain the milkweed plants throughout the summer.

 

Now is the time for farm families to get involved with the challenge and receive their own milkweed seedlings to plant this spring. Visit  www.monarchchallenge.com.

 

About BASF’s Crop Protection division

 

With a rapidly growing population, the world is increasingly dependent on our ability to develop and maintain sustainable agriculture and healthy environments. BASF’s Crop Protection division works with farmers, agricultural professionals, pest management experts and others to help make this possible. With their cooperation, BASF is able to sustain an active R&D pipeline, an innovative portfolio of products and services, and teams of experts in the lab and in the field to support customers in making their businesses succeed. In 2016, BASF’s Crop Protection division generated sales of €5.6 billion. For more information, please visit us at www.agriculture.basf.com or on any of our social media channels.

 

About BASF

 

BASF Corporation, headquartered in Florham Park, New Jersey, is the North American affiliate of BASF SE, Ludwigshafen, Germany. BASF has nearly 17,500 employees in North America, and had sales of $16.2 billion in 2016. For more information about BASF’s North American operations, visit www.basf.com.

 

At BASF, we create chemistry for a sustainable future. We combine economic success with environmental protection and social responsibility. The approximately 114,000 employees in the BASF Group work on contributing to the success of our customers in nearly all sectors and almost every country in the world. Our portfolio is organized into five segments: Chemicals, Performance Products, Functional Materials & Solutions, Agricultural Solutions and Oil & Gas. BASF generated sales of about €58 billion in 2016. BASF shares are traded on the stock exchanges in Frankfurt (BAS), London (BFA) and Zurich (BAS). Further information at www.basf.com.