The Race to Save the Sacramento Mountains Checkerspot Butterfly - The New York Times

The Sacramento Mountains checkerspot butterfly is critically endangered, with the last known larva living in a lab in New Mexico. The Sacramento Mountains checkerspot butterfly is critically endangered, with the last known larva living in a lab in New Mexico. Credit... Supported by By Catrin Einhorn Photographs and Video by Diana Cervantes Despite the high stakes, the tiny caterpillar in the Albuquerque lab was not given a name. It’s the last known individual of its kind, the critically endangered Sacramento Mountains checkerspot. If the caterpillar survives, it will transform into a butterfly with wings of stenciled orange, black and cream. Scientists hope to breed it by finding and capturing another from the wild, if any are left. But last summer, as researchers prepared for weeks of searching for the subspecies in the only place on earth it might be found, the Sacramento Mountains of New Mexico, they knew that their chances of finding any were low. Despite annual surveys, it hadn’t

The Sacramento Mountains checkerspot butterfly is critically endangered, with the last known larva living in a lab in New Mexico. The Sacramento Mountains checkerspot butterfly is critically endangered, with the last known larva living in a lab in New Mexico. Credit... Supported by By Catrin Einhorn Photographs and Video by Diana Cervantes Despite the high stakes, the tiny caterpillar in the Albuquerque lab was not given a name. It’s the last known individual of its kind, the critically endangered Sacramento Mountains checkerspot. If the caterpillar survives, it will transform into a butterfly