When to Expect Your Tagging Kit

Tagging kits are a preorder item. All preorders from January 1–July 21 will begin to ship in July, to arrive ahead of the migration in your area. Orders placed after July 21 should arrive within 7-10 days but priority will be given to preorders and areas that will experience the migration first.

Not all pre-ordered Tagging Kits ship at the same time. We start shipping orders with the northernmost addresses first and work our way south. We ship to time the arrival of your tags with peak migration in your area. For example, if peak migration in your area is in October, we will ship your tags in late September.

Tagging too early can lead to unintentionally tagging summer generations of monarchs that will not migrate for overwintering. You should begin tagging no earlier than 3 weeks before the peak migration in your area.  You can determine peak migration in your area using the chart below.  If you do not know your latitude, you can search your zip code on the internet to find it - ex. "66047 latitude".
 

How Tagging Kits Ship

Tagging kits ship via USPS First Class Mail without tracking and can take 5-7 days to be delivered (not including any USPS delays). Tagging kits ship separately from all other items.

Why Tags are Only Available for Fall Migration

The focus of our tagging program is the fall migration and helps answer questions about the origins of monarchs that reach Mexico, the timing and pace of the migration, mortality during the migration, and changes in geographic distribution. It also shows that the probability of reaching Mexico is related to geographic location, size of the butterfly, and the date (particularly as this relates to the migration window for a given location).  For more information regarding monarch tagging, please click here.

Order Statuses

Please be aware that your order status may say "Complete" before your tags are shipped. This is due to the long preorder timeframe. Your tags will still be sent according to the schedule above.