Beautiful and graceful monarch butterflies, welcome visitors to summer gardens all over Iowa, are getting a boost from a joint effort by farm groups, state agencies, agribusiness companies and Iowa State University (ISU).

The effort is a voluntary, statewide effort designed to increase habitat and breeding areas for monarchs in Iowa’s rural and urban landscapes. It will concentrate on planting habitat for the butterflies on less productive farmland and pastures, buffer strips and other conservation areas, roadsides and other right-of-ways and in community gardens and demonstration projects spon­sored by the consortium.

The...