Vanessa Butterfly Migration Project; Request for Red Admiral, Painted Lady Sightings

[Anne Kilmer]

Oh, wow! There is a Santa Claus. (Or would that be the Easter Bunny? To 
merit whose gifts one doesn't even have to be good ... )
This is exactly the project I envisioned and described to Colin (my 
futurescope at work, of course), only it needs to be worldwide ... 
Royce, can you do that? ;-)
And of course IBBA will be there with the tags for the released Painted 
Ladies. They're already doing this for Monarchs, so why not.
And you'll input dates and times of releases, across our fair land, so 
people will actually know where their released bugs go, and how they 
impact the fates of the rest of them.
And the kids will all be out there looking for Painted Ladies, and 
they'll plant their gardens for rare butterflies, and take home plants, 
  and I'm betting they'll find plenty of Miami Blues, once they start 
looking ... or Karner Blues, or whatever Blues you choose.
Ain't it awesome how good life is when we all work together?
Anne Kilmer
Butterfly Coalition

Joel Lyons wrote:

> YayyyYYY, something OTHER than
> Monarchs, count me in!
> 
> Heh heh,
> Joel
> 
> Royce J Bitzer wrote:
> 
> 
>>Leps-L Members,
>>
>>This message is to announce the start of the 2002 _Vanessa_ Butterfly
>>Migration Project.  In a way similar to Journey North's Monarch tracking,
>>we will be mapping migration and seasonal distribution of four _Vanessa_
>>butterflies in North America:
>>
>>Red Admiral (_Vanessa atalanta_)
>>Painted Lady (_Vanessa cardui_)
>>American Lady (_Vanessa virginiensis_)
>>West Coast Lady (_Vanessa annabella_)
>>1.      We are looking for observers to tell us the first date that they
>>see (or have seen) any of these butterflies in their area, and the numbers
>>seen that day.  If the butterfly was a permanent winter resident in your
>>area this year, please tell us likewise.
>>
>>2.      If there are noticeable directional migrations of these species
>>this year, we would appreciate your reports of these migrations.
>>
>>3.      Reports of presence or abundance of these butterflies later in the
>>season are also welcome.  We encourage multiple observations from the same
>>region.
>>
>>Please include your full name, e-mail address, the location from which you
>>observed, and the date or dates when you see these butterflies.  For
>>evident directional migrations, please include also the direction toward
>>which they seem to be moving.  A rough estimate of how frequently they are
>>passing through (for example, 10 butterflies over 20 minutes) would also be
>>helpful, as would notes on temperature, wind speed and direction, and type
>>and extent of cloud cover.
>>
>>For more information about this project and how to report your
>>observations, see the Red Admiral and Painted Lady Research Site
>>
>>http://www.public.iastate.edu/~mariposa/homepage.html
>>
>>Select the links "Help track the 2002 North American Migrations" and "How
>>to Report Your Observations."  We are taking observations through e-mail
>>(mariposa at iastate.edu) at the moment, but hope to have a reporting form and
>>database available soon to make reporting easier.
>>
>>We have also included maps of the progress of the large spring 2001 Red
>>Admiral and Painted Lady migrations at
>>
>>http://www.public.iastate.edu/~mariposa/maps2001.htm
>>
>>Last spring, as many of you may recall, I requested springtime Red Admiral
>>migration sightings from observers on Leps-L.  These included both
>>sightings of the first Red Admiral of the season and of migrating Red
>>Admirals, mostly in the eastern and midwestern U.S.  At the same time, a
>>Painted Lady migration was underway in the western states, and many people
>>likewise posted their observations.  Many of the sightings included on
>>these maps are from data you sent to me or to Leps-L last year.  Now I can
>>show you on these maps what the patterns of last year's migrations were
>>like.  Thanks again to everyone for their observations.
>>
>>If anyone else has observations from last year that they would like to
>>share, please feel free to send these to us also.  We will add them to the
>>existing maps.
>>
>>Thank you for your time and interest,
>>
>>Royce Bitzer
>>mariposa at iastate.edu
>>
>>Department of Entomology
>>113A Insectary
>>Iowa State University
>>Ames, Iowa  50011-3140
>>
> 
> 




 
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