Support for LAist comes from
Local and national news, NPR, things to do, food recommendations and guides to Los Angeles, Orange County and the Inland Empire
Stay Connected
Listen

Share This

News

A Giant Swarm Of Butterflies Has Arrived In SoCal

Painted Lady butterflies are flying north after heavy rains and flourishing food sources caused the population to explode. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
()

Congress has cut federal funding for public media — a $3.4 million loss for LAist. We count on readers like you to protect our nonprofit newsroom. Become a monthly member and sustain local journalism.

If you've spent any time outside recently, you may have seen an oddly high number... of butterflies.

They're called Painted Ladies, and they look and fly like Monarchs. They're orange, black and white and no more than a couple inches long. Living Desert Zoo and Gardens Conservation Director Dr. James Danoff-Burg calls them "magical floating jewels."

"The animals are just a constant flow, like water flowing over the ground. It's just so many of them in some places," he said.

The butterflies call the areas surrounding the U.S.-Mexico border home. They've come up to the L.A. area because of the rain storms that have been sweeping Southern California.

Support for LAist comes from

More rain means more butterfly food. And more butterfly food means more butterflies.

Brandy Yi of La Crescenta sent us this photo of a Painted Lady butterfly in her yard on Friday, March 8, 2019. (Courtesy Brandy Yi Photography)
()

The Painted Ladies were doing so well down south that their habitat became overcrowded... so now they're moving upstate to lay their eggs, en masse.

"They then have such a dense population that they need to disperse," Danoff-Burg said.

He lives in the Coachella Valley, where the butterflies have been flying north by the thousands to lay their eggs.

The bad news is that the Painted Ladies who fly further north, to the Central Valley, most likely won't be able to handle the colder temperatures during the winter. Danoff-Burg calls it a one-way trip.

"Their reproductive success won't be great," he said.

Support for LAist comes from

Looking to keep the magical floating jewels around? Danoff-Burg said the answer is planting more native California plants for them to feed on. That, and driving slower.

"The slower we drive the more response time they have to fly higher in the air to avoid your car and not become paint on the front of your grill," he said.

He said the best view of the Painted Ladies is in the Coachella Valley. But viewers have to hurry. Their adult life expectancy is 2-4 weeks.

This story is part of Elemental: Covering Sustainability, a multimedia collaboration between Cronkite News, Arizona PBS, KJZZ, KPCC, Rocky Mountain PBS and PBS SoCal.

As Editor-in-Chief of our newsroom, I’m extremely proud of the work our top-notch journalists are doing here at LAist. We’re doing more hard-hitting watchdog journalism than ever before — powerful reporting on the economy, elections, climate and the homelessness crisis that is making a difference in your lives. At the same time, it’s never been more difficult to maintain a paywall-free, independent news source that informs, inspires, and engages everyone.

Simply put, we cannot do this essential work without your help. Federal funding for public media has been clawed back by Congress and that means LAist has lost $3.4 million in federal funding over the next two years. So we’re asking for your help. LAist has been there for you and we’re asking you to be here for us.

We rely on donations from readers like you to stay independent, which keeps our nonprofit newsroom strong and accountable to you.

No matter where you stand on the political spectrum, press freedom is at the core of keeping our nation free and fair. And as the landscape of free press changes, LAist will remain a voice you know and trust, but the amount of reader support we receive will help determine how strong of a newsroom we are going forward to cover the important news from our community.

Please take action today to support your trusted source for local news with a donation that makes sense for your budget.

Thank you for your generous support and believing in independent news.

Chip in now to fund your local journalism
A row of graphics payment types: Visa, MasterCard, Apple Pay and PayPal, and  below a lock with Secure Payment text to the right
(
LAist
)

Trending on LAist