Painted Lady

Painted Ladies are classic migrators. During the spring, these butterflies can be either invisible, scarce, or incredibly abundant as they migrate northward from Northern Mexico through the western and midwestern United States and to Canada. Painted Lady spring migrations can include millions of individual butterflies when Northern Mexico receives a lot of precipitation during the waning winter months.

Painted Ladies are relatively easy to raise as their caterpillars make conspicuous webbed nests on thistles and other weeds. Click here to watch video on how to find these nests.

Click on any image below to start slide show.

Female Painted Lady

Here is painted lady female butterfly raised from caterpillar.
Painted Lady Adult Series

Here is a photo of two males and two female painted ladies. The males are on the left and the underside (ventral surfaces) are below.
Painted Lady Caterpillar Nest

Here is a nest made by a mid-grown (third instar) painted lady caterpillar. The caterpillar cannot digest the harry substance of the thistle leaf and therefore uses that and silking to create a nest to protect itself from predators. Under the silk, you can find both the painted lady caterpillar as well as its frass (poop).

With experience, recognizing these nests can become relatively easy. Always look on thistles 2-4 weeks after a painted lady outbreak. Thistles can be found in neighborhoods, disturbed areas, new housing developments, near freeway offramps, in valley floor wet meadows, or even in the mountains.

Other plants that painted ladies caterpillars use include Lupens, Sunflowers, Nettles, and others.
Painted Lady Fifth Instar Caterpillar Nest

Here is a nest made by a fifth instar painted lady caterpillar.
Painted Lady Fifth Instar Caterpillar

Here is the same nest broken open so that you can see the painted lady fifth instar caterpillar on the right side of the picture.
Painted Lady fourth instar caterpillar

Here is a fourth instar painted lady caterpillar.
Painted Lady Fifth instar caterpillar

Here is a closeup photo of a last instar painted lady caterpillar. These caterpillars can show quite a bit of color variation.
Painted Lady Rearing Container

Raising Painted Ladies is relatively easy. Simply place a caterpillar on a thistle leaf and place with other leaves (to keep moist) in what we call a squat tub (cottage cheese or ice cream tub) with poked holes in the lid.

- Remove frass that falls on the bottom of the tub daily (Don't worry about frass in the nest)

- Replace leaves with fresh ones every three days

- If you don't want to handle the caterpillar, cut the leaf that surrounds the caterpillar with scissors and place in with new leaves
Sequence of Pupation and Emergence

Here is a collage of a painted lady prepupa, pupa, developing pupa, and the actual butterfly emerging. Photos courtesy Nicky Davis.
Painted Lady Butterfly Emerges

Once your painted lady emerges, it will then spread out and then dry its wings. While it does that, it should remain in a dark area for roughly 12 hours to allow its wings to harden.