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It’s a long way from Chicago to Texas, but what’s a thousand miles between butterfly rescuers?

Bob Erlich lives in Evergreen Park.

Therese Smith lives in Austin, Texas.

They’ve never met but, thanks to a Facebook post, they recently became cohorts in a quest to save nine monarch butterflies.

Their 11th-hour mission spared the late-blooming insects a certain death and gave them a chance to catch up with fellow migratory journeyers en route to the monarchs’ winter roost in central Mexico.

In late October, a friend called Erlich about nine caterpillars she’d found in her garden. Erlich took the larvae back to his south suburban home, which he has converted to a veritable butterfly hostel over the past 18 years, and pondered what to do.

If he

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