Request for Red Admiral, Painted Lady Sightings

[Royce J Bitzer]

Leps-L Members:

This message is to announce the start of the 2003 _Vanessa_ Butterfly 
Migration Project.  In a way similar to Journey North's and Digital Monarch 
Watch'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 2003 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 may be making changes 
to the reporting system soon; when we do, we'll post revised instructions.

We have also included maps of the progress of the 2001 and 2002 movements 
of these butterflies at

http://www.public.iastate.edu/~mariposa/maps2001.htm
http://www.public.iastate.edu/~mariposa/maps2002.htm

If you have observations from previous years that you would like to share, 
please feel free to send these to us also.  We will add them to the 
existing maps.

Many thanks to all of you who sent in observations last year!  Because of 
your efforts, 2002 was a very successful year for mapping seasonal 
distribution and movements of Vanessa butterflies, especially the Red 
Admiral.  We have gotten a few 2003 sightings so far, and have posted the 
list of observers who have reported Red Admirals so far this year.

Please pass this message on to others whom you think might be interested in 
this project.

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

Patrick Brown
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Facility
218 Durham Center
Iowa State University
Ames, Iowa  50011-2251
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