Some very hungry monarch caterpillars may be struggling to find a bite in Oklahoma these days.

The big, iconic orange and black butterflies listed under the federal Endangered Species Act as “warranted but precluded at this time by higher priority listing actions” and recently listed as endangered on The International Union for Conservation of Nature’s “red list,” are in a pinch this year in Oklahoma.

It’s not unlike many other years, but the success of the season’s first returning monarchs can impact how many will be ready to fly back to Mexico next fall, reports the University of Kansas-based Monarch Watch research project.

Known for the 4,000-mile range the species covers from its wintering grounds in Mexico to northern summer populations at the Canada border, experts point to several challenges for the insects; among them changing weather patterns and habitat loss.

Spring migrators make their way across the Gulf of Mexico to Texas each March and roll into Oklahoma in April. These first returning butterflies, the same butterflies that flew south through here last September and October, return with an urgent need to lay eggs for the next generation before they die. Rare is the egg-laying migrant that survives beyond May 1.

“We’re told they didn’t stay long enough in Texas to get a lot of egg laying done and we’re glad they’re laying now in Oklahoma,” said Sandy Schwinn, a longtime observer just now stepping down from her role as Oklahoma Conservation Specialist for Monarch Watch. “It was warm and they were just blown into Oklahoma on those crazy high winds.”

Schwinn said she spotted her first monarch of the season on April 2, six more the following day, and, on average, about three more a day since then. Reports from watchers across the state reflect that same timeframe.

Priority one for these monarchs is finding “host” milkweed plants, the only food their caterpillars will eat.

“The milkweed has been slow to grow this spring,” Schwinn said. “It’s been cold and we really could use another dose of rain about now.”

The butterflies have been showing Schwinn where wild milkweeds are growing on her property.

“They scour the fields searching for milkweed and that’s how I find it, when they stop to lay eggs,” she said.

She has seen “egg dumping” with the female butterflies dropping eight or more eggs on small milkweed shoots. It only takes about four days for a monarch egg to hatch, so the plant doesn’t have much time to grow before it’s devoured by hungry caterpillars.

This “down south” production phase sets the stage for the summer-long reproductive efforts, according to reports from Monarch Watch founder Chip Taylor.

The March and April arrivals give rise to new butterflies in late April and May, which continue the migration north with second and third generations. Fourth and fifth-generation monarchs are the ones that make the return trip to Mexico.

Conditions that allow, or force, the monarchs to move north before the milkweeds have emerged have in past years resulted in population dips, Taylor reported at MonarchWatch.org.

Taylor emphasized that the added pressures of changing weather make habitat improvements and planting native milkweed plants increasingly important, to help balance out what people can’t control.

Schwinn said some organic and native-specialty greenhouses across the state offer plants for sale and that Okies For Monarchs, representing a statewide pollinator initiative of multiple groups and agencies, offers multiple resources, including lists of where to buy plants and seeds, at okiesformonarchs.org.