September 21, 2017

Smashing Painted Ladies

I was driving up the canyon into the Wet Mountain Valley, flinching every time that a Painted Lady butterfly hit the windshield.

They are migrating this time of year, headed south, and apparently this summer produced good breeding conditions.

"I must have killed millions of them," said the FedEx driver as she passed a package to the café owner in Westcliffe.

"We'll call her Butterfly Killer," said the owner facetiously, after the driver went out the door.

As usual, we go smashing along through beauty.

UPDATE: The migration was large enough to create radar echoes. That's kind of wonderful.

1 comment:

Nancie N Bartley said...

O my gosh, yes. So that's what they were. Drove from the Springs to Salida and need to clean the windshield. I was expecting to see tarantulas on the road but not so many butterflies on my windshield.