Dear friends,

During Reiman Garden's Day of Insects, I was able to find a contact in our state house who gave me some advice as to who to target with an email campaign alongside this petition. With their assistance, I finally put together an email template that you can copy and paste into your own email and send to the legislators . Feel free to modify the message based on what you'd like to convey! It will be received by all the members of the state government committees in the Iowa House and Senate. 

Email Template:

TO: ken.rozenboom@legis.iowa.gov, jeff.reichman@legis.iowa.gov, cindy.winckler@legis.iowa.gov, kevin.alons@legis.iowa.gov, tony.bisignano@legis.iowa.gov, matt.blake@legis.iowa.gov, mike.bousselot@legis.iowa.gov, doug.campbell@legis.iowa.gov, claire.celsi@legis.iowa.gov, dawn.driscoll@legis.iowa.gov, jesse.green@legis.iowa.gov, dennis.guth@legis.iowa.gov, carrie.koelker@legis.iowa.gov, sandy.salmon@legis.iowa.gov, jason.schultz@legis.iowa.gov, art.staed@legis.iowa.gov, thomas.townsend@legis.iowa.gov, scott.webster@legis.iowa.gov, cherielynn.westrich@legis.iowa.gov, jane.bloomingdale@legis.iowa.gov, jennifer.smith@legis.iowa.gov, amy.nielsen@legis.iowa.gov, michael.bergan@legis.iowa.gov, jacob.bossman@legis.iowa.gov, taylor.collins@legis.iowa.gov, jeff.cooling@legis.iowa.gov, jon.dunwell@legis.iowa.gov, austin.harris@legis.iowa.gov, heather.hora@legis.iowa.gov, tom.jeneary@legis.iowa.gov, craig.johnson@legis.iowa.gov, megan.jones@legis.iowa.gov, bobby.kaufmann@legis.iowa.gov, shannon.lundgren@legis.iowa.gov, brent.siegrist@legis.iowa.gov, megan.srinivas@legis.iowa.gov, josh.turek@legis.iowa.gov, ross.wilburn@legis.iowa.gov, hans.wilz@legis.iowa.gov, derek.wulf@legis.iowa.gov, adam.zabner@legis.iowa.gov

SUBJECT: Regal Fritillary for State Butterfly

MESSAGE:

Dear legislators,

I urge you to support the effort to make the regal fritillary our state butterfly.

Let’s start by outlining Iowa’s existing state symbols: the wild rose (state flower), the geode (state rock), the American goldfinch (bird), and the oak (tree). According to the State Symbols USA website, Iowa has fewer symbols than any other state. And while 48 states have a designated state insect, Iowa and Michigan have none.

The last time our people designated a state symbol was with the geode in 1967. Has our state pride for Iowa and what inhabits our land dried up in the last 57 years?

Some of you may already be nodding your heads. Of course we should have a state butterfly! Let’s pick one everyone knows, like the monarch butterfly. Yet the monarch is already one of the most overused butterflies as a state symbol. In contrast, the regal fritillary is native to the tallgrass prairie, which is now being restored in many parts of our state. It is a large, identifiable species with a 4-inch wingspan of vibrant orange, soft maroon, rich browns, sweet creams, and a hint of deep purple. Its host plant is the native prairie violet, whose leaves it chews on throughout the spring as it molts six times over. (Now that’s a hungry caterpillar!)

Becoming our state insect wouldn’t give the regal fritillary any new conservation statuses or protections, though Iowa’s population of this stunning butterfly is threatened due to habitat loss. But it would inform the public of its beauty and resilience, two attributes it shares with Iowa.

As your constituent, I hope that recognizing the regal fritillary will allow Iowa to follow Tennessee’s example in naming a state butterfly as well as a state agricultural insect.

Sincerely,

YOUR NAME HERE

Some of you might've also seen the recent Gazette article about others pushing for a state horse and a state fish. I'm currently working on reaching out to these folks so that we can combine our efforts. Here's the article if you're interested in hearing about the other symbols folks are proposing: https://www.thegazette.com/article/curious-iowa-how-are-official-state-symbols-designated/