Innate Nectar Plant Attraction Is Primarily Visually-Guided but Olfactory-Stimulated in North American Monarch Butterflies
Assadia DAE, Green DA 2nd. Ecology and evolution, June 2025.
Read the paper Free to read · doi:10.1002/ece3.71533
What this paper is about
Naive monarchs that had never fed were offered Lantana camara, a common nectar plant, in a test that did not force them to choose.
They were drawn to it without having learned to be. Sight alone was enough to hold the attraction at the distance tested, but scent made the visual cue more compelling.
Summarised here from the abstract below. Not the authors’ words.
Abstract
In flower-visiting insects, innate sensory preferences facilitate efficient foraging strategies in complex natural environments. Here we describe a nonforced choice assay to investigate innate attraction to a common nectar resource (Lantana camara) in naïve monarch butterflies (Danaus plexippus). We find that monarch butterflies have an innate attraction to L. camara in our assay. Visual cues are necessary and sufficient for sustained attraction at the tested range. However, olfactory cues increase the salience of visual cues for sustained attraction. The identities of the specific attractive visual or olfactory cues are not resolved. Altogether, this simple nonforced choice assay is suited to reveal quantitative differences in innate attraction in monarchs and, presumably, other insects.
Abstract reproduced from the published paper, which is licensed CC BY. Copyright remains with the authors.
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"Innate Nectar Plant Attraction Is Primarily Visually-Guided but Olfactory-Stimulated in North American Monarch Butterflies (listing)." Milkweed USA, 2026, https://milkweedusa.com/research/innate-nectar-plant-attraction-is-primarily-visually-guided-but-2025/. Accessed DATE.
Milkweed USA. "Innate Nectar Plant Attraction Is Primarily Visually-Guided but Olfactory-Stimulated in North American Monarch Butterflies (listing)." Last modified 2026-08-01. Accessed DATE. https://milkweedusa.com/research/innate-nectar-plant-attraction-is-primarily-visually-guided-but-2025/.
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author = {{Milkweed USA}},
year = {2026},
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