Warblers and a Painted Lady

Recently I ventured into Hixon Forest with binoculars in hand hoping to catch a glimpse of some of the elusive and fleeting warblers migrating through our area. Indeed, I was rewarded with some dandies- a black and white, black throated green, and, one of my favorites, the magnolia warbler. But that wasn't all- I also saw a stunning orange butterfly with black tipped wings dotted with white spots, feeding on a flower. As it folded and unfolded its wings, I could see its telltale 4 spots visible on its underwing- a Painted Lady! This butterfly is difficult to distinguish from the American Lady from above, but the American Lady has only two spots. What a beautiful sight!

Later that day I opened up the May issue of Scientific American and came across a short article titled "Epic Migrations". And, as so often happens, serendipity struck and the article was about the Painted Lady describing its incredible annual long-haul journey. It is the ultramarathoner of butterflies flying up to 9,300 miles back and forth between Scandinavia and Africa over 8 to 10 generations, twice as far as the Monarch in North Ameica. Some individuals fly up to 2,500 miles traveling up to 30 miles per hour! In North America they "only" travel from Mexico to Canada and do so over about 6 generations. Magnolia warblers also migrate from Mexico to Canada pitting a single performer against a relay team.

Here is description of the Painted Lady from the fantastic website Wisconsin Butterflies: https://wisconsinbutterflies.org/butterfly/species/91-painted-lady, and two photos from that link:

Next, I remembered seeing an article about this butterfly in the NY Times, looked it up and found this from 4/10/25: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/10/opinion/butterflies-migration-climate-change.html What an incredible insect! They are on every continent in the world except Antarctica, and have even been documented to cross the Atlantic Ocean from the west coast of Africa to South America, the only insect known to make such a journey!

So, what is more impressive- that magnolia warbler flying back and forth from Mexico to Canada single-handedly or the Painted Lady doing the same over 6 generations? Both are remarkable, but one aspect that is mind boggling is that the Painted Lady has to "remember" the whole migration scheme from egg to adult over several generations. Here is the life cycle of this butterfly:

Those eggs are about one millimeter in diameter in which all the information to carry on in this incredible journey is stored. Each cycle takes about 10 weeks with the adults living for only about 3-4 weeks.

Last, I remembered one more recent NY Times article, this time a sobering one about butterflies published in the journal Science. Here I learned that butterflies in general have decreased a estimated 22% in the last 20 years in the contiguous United States; https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/06/climate/us-butterfly-population.html. The study included 342 butterfly species, 116 of which can be found in La Crosse. Of these, 83 are decreasing nationally. The Amercian Lady, in the same genus as the Painted Lady, is down 58%.

What can we do? The article states that the big three contributing to the decline are habitat loss, climate change, and pesticides, especially neonicotinoids. The last two can seem daunting for an individual and need policy action on a national and worldwide level. If climate change continues at its current pace and further upsets the weather patterns throughout the world, the amazing migrations of both the Painted Lady and magnolia warbler may be altered significantly- or stop altogether. In the meantime, increasing habitat can be achieved in small doses by all of us, even in our own backyards. Please support Friends of the Blufflands as we try to do just that on our bluffs while maybe giving a magnolia warbler a place to refuel and a Painted Lady a home.