Monarch butterflies could be elevated to “threatened” species as proposed this week by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, but some officials in Texas say that would interfere with

The Endangered Species Act affords extensive protections to species the wildlife service lists as endangered or threatened. Under the act, it's illegal to import, export, possess, transport or kill an endangered species. A threatened listing allows for exceptions to those protections.

While a devastatingly low number of monarch butterflies migrate to San Luis Obispo County this winter, the federal government has proposed listing the insect as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, a step aimed at reversing the species’ steep population decline.