Flying flowers? That’s what some folks call butterflies.
The first summer we spent in our house, the trees were filled with Monarch butterflies. There were hundreds of them flying around our yard. The nearby alfalfa fields were home to a great many yellow butterflies as well. Even our vegetable garden got into the act when some swallowtail caterpillars decided to much down our some herbs we had growing. Sadly, many Monarchs died that next winter in Mexico and we haven’t seen that many for several years now. But we stayed curious about butterflies and moths.
My wife was searching around for information yesterday and found an interesting site - The Butterflies and Moths of North America website. The site was developed by the Big Sky Institute at Montana State University. One cool feature about the site is, of course, the map.
Using the map feature, you can find what butterflies or moths have been spotted in any US county or Mexican state. The detail map shows you the states or counties, the overview map shows you your current extent in the larger geographic context.
It works quite well, and in no time we were able to find out what butterflies and moths have been spotted in our county. In fact, we found that a moth my wife had seen (and photographed) had not been officially seen there. Luckily the site has instructions on how to get new species registered.
The data shown by the site include images of the butterfly and caterpillar (in most cases) and other information about the species. A very cool site for gardeners and butterfly lovers.
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